Equity-based efforts to change qualifications for the Dean’s List will make more students eligible for this academic achievement.

The College Council decided to push their changes in Dean’s List requirements for the upcoming Board of Trustees meeting on Dec. 20.

The Dean’s List is an academic honor where qualified students have their names gathered on a list of recognition for their academic achievement.

According to the El Camino College (ECC) archived catalog website, a student can qualify for the Dean’s List if they are enrolled in 12 or more units in a semester and finish with a grade point average of 3.5 or higher.

The decision to change the qualifications for the Dean’s List was made when officials from the school learned of students who performed well in the courses they were in, but could not take on the course load of a full-time student.

“We learned that there were students such as some of our SRC [Special Resource Center] students who just didn’t have the capacity to take a full load, but they were doing well with the units that they were carrying and so they were part of the impetus of this change,” Interim Vice President Jacquelyn Sims said when reading Academic Senate Representative Darcie McClelland’s words.

The Special Resource Center is a program at ECC that specializes in helping students with disabilities.

The new changes would make more students eligible for the Dean’s List without having to enroll as full-time students.

Sims was attributing McClelland’s words when she said, “The decision has been to allow any student to be on the Dean’s List if they have at least six units in that particular semester but they have accumulated at least 12 units overall at El Camino.”

There were multiple reasons given by the College Council to change the requirements for students to get on the Dean’s List.

“Like Vice President Sims just said, started with a conversation over SRC and then we in Ed Policies kind of talked about, well this is an equity issue overall,” McClelland said. “Students with disabilities are not the only students whose lives prevent them from taking 12 units.”

McClelland linked the accessibility to the Dean’s List to the school’s celebration of the students.

“Shouldn’t we be celebrating all of our students’ accomplishments who are doing well, even if their life situation prevents them from taking a full load at this time?” McClelland said.

ECC College Council decided to put the changes in the agenda for the Board of Trustees as an informational item before implementing them.

“Past practice has been we never actually officially adopt something until it’s been an informational item on the board if it’s an AP [Administrative Procedure],” McClelland said.

The new change in Dean’s List requirements is believed to be beneficial to the wider range of students who would qualify for placement.

“As Darcie said, celebrating people’s success. That keeps people enrolled, and keeps people motivated and gets rid of the imposter syndrome,” Vice President Representative Ross Miyashiro said.