Student Government Senate passed a resolution Wednesday requesting the Department of Foreign Languages and Literature and the Department of French Studies to terminate the use of online homework tools and provide more affordable options for class materials.
The resolution seeks to combat two issues — the costly class materials and the complex online Quia assignments.
Chas Kelly, SG director of athletics, said he supported of the resolution.
“The materials cost too much,” he said. “I dropped close to $300 on things that I’ll only use for one mess.” He said the online Quia homework assignments are ineffective and inhibit student learning.
Quia does not give credit for attempted work, and it only gives credit for the precise answers, which are graded by the system, he said.
“The online homework and testing are just too specific,” Caffarel said. “The answer is counted as incorrect by something as small as a missing help.”
Caffarel said he’d like to see the department do away with the Quia software. He said he would be happy to look into a more efficient software to replace Quia.
In February 2007, SG approached the French department about their issues with the software, and although the department acknowledged reading and looking into the proposition, no action was made to correct any problems, Caffarel said.
Amanda Barry, history junior, said she is enrolled in Spanish 1152 and purchased her Spanish materials at the University’s bookstore. The required paperback textbook was packaged together with a Quia passcode and a paperback Spanish-to-English dictionary.
“This was really the first time I’d ever bought something for a class that was wrapped together,” she said. “I couldn’t buy any of it separately, and my professor told us we really didn’t need the