Satisfactory Academic Progress
SAP stands for Satisfactory Academic Progress. Its purpose is to keep students on track for successful completion of a degree and to prevent unnecessary financial burden on those students that do not finish a program.
Several years ago, the Academic Standards and Student Records Committee composed of faculty, administrators and staff, became aware that some students struggled from semester to semester but continued to sign up for classes and accrue a very low grade point average (GPA). In addition, many of these students borrowed money to finance their classes and became deeper in debt. Most of these students dropped out altogether, never completing the program they had been pursuing.
The committee recommended enforcing a standard 2.0 GPA for all course work and moving underperforming students into a probationary status when their GPA drops below this standard. Because of the state government’s growing concern about students’ completion rates, we have also added a completion rate standard of 70 percent of hours attempted to encourage students to complete the courses they sign up for and progress more rapidly toward graduation.