from Haaretz:

Striking teachers fail Schechter Institute plan to pass students

The Schechter Institute is seriously endangering its academic credentials by announcing it will give students a passing grade this semester if a current teachers strike has not ended by Monday, the institution’s workers committee said this week.

The teachers added that the president of the Schechter Institute of Jewish Studies, Rabbi David Golinkin, lacks the authority to pass students in lieu of a settlement.

… The measures Schechter is threatening to enact by Monday are not intended to pressure the workers but are “simply a reply to our students who have been asking us for a few weeks what’s going to happen to them,” Golinkin said. “We have a moral and legal obligation to let our students finish their semester,” he added.

For Anna Gerrard, however, a passing grade this semester is not good enough. The 31-year-old Londoner, who is studying for an M.A. at Schechter as part of a rabbinical program in the U.K., is still waiting for grades from the previous semester.

“These grades are incredibly important to me because they constitute parts of my studies and my rabbinic ordination depends on them,” said Gerrard, adding that she needs to complete her studies here before her planned move back to London this summer.

“It’s about deadlines – I’m supposed to be ordained a rabbi in July and if I don’t have all my grades by then there is a question mark whether my college will do that.”