By: Madelynn Brower
Bleary-eyed after less than five hours of sleep, sophomore nursing major Jackson Robison stumbles into Morning Meditations, the group worship offered in Talge Hall every morning at 7 a.m. To make up ground on collecting the amount of worship credit necessary to register for next semester’s classes, Robison is forced to choose going to school assemblies over working his usual 30 hours a week at Erlanger hospital in Chattanooga, often getting off shifts at two in the morning.
For Robison and many other students, getting the required worship credits each semester has not been easy.
“All the time that I have that I’m not either studying or in class, I’m usually working, which makes getting worship credits intensely difficult,” said Robison. “Southern is an expensive school. I shouldn’t have to be calling off work so that I can go to worship.”
There are two different types of worship credits, and two different requirements for each. The first is enrichment credits, which can sometimes be obtained in sets of twos, by attending events such as vespers, hall worships in the dorms and Morning Meditations in Talge Hall. The second is cultural credits, also usually obtained from convocations and music recitals.
According to Southern’s residence life website, each class standing has its own level of credits required. For campus residents, freshmen must get 60 credits in total, 16 of which are cultural. Sophomores must get 55 credits with 14 being cultural. Juniors must get 32 credits total, eight cultural, and finally, for seniors, the number drops to 30 credits, eight of which are cultural. Students in their graduating semester are not required to get credits.
Students such as Jeremy Zamora, a sophomore nursing major, acknowledge that while it’s important to go to events to collect credits, there are also challenges faced by some students to gain the required amount.
“I think it’s important for students to have to go to vespers and get worship credit and cultural credit,” said Zamora, “but I feel like having the rate or the amount at the end of the semester is a little bit challenging for some other students who might have other extracurricular activities that hinder them from attending.”
When students do not obtain the correct amount of worship credits, 50% of their total before Fall break, several consequences may arise. One is a hold being placed on a student’s academic accounts, which prevents them from registering for the next semester’s classes. Students must then get the required level of credit before they can register.
In an email to the Accent, Dennis Negrón addressed some of the other issues that could arise if students do not get their credits in time.
“There are other consequences [besides being unable to register for classes] for those who ultimately end a semester with excessive misses,” said Negrón. “One, ineligibility to hold a student leadership position; two, ineligibility to apply to live in upper-classmen housing; and three, ineligibility to apply for a Housing Exception to live off campus.”
According to Negrón, about 5% of students received a hold on their account at the beginning of October, many of whom have resolved the issues and had the hold removed.
When asked if they think the amount of credit required by the school is unreasonable, there have been mixed reactions among students. Some believe the amounts are fair, while others struggle to get the required amount.
One area that students stated they struggled with is a lack of engagement in the services offered to students for credit. Some students mentioned their difficulty connecting with various worship services due to a lack of cultural relevance.
Ariana Davis, a freshman film production major, mentioned some of the dissatisfactions in an interview with the Accent.
“Considering that vespers is pretty stagnant, and it doesn’t really cater towards different groups or demographics of our student body, I just feel like the amount [of credits] they’re asking, especially with how it literally affects your ability to stay here and your enrollment, I think it is unreasonable,” said Davis.
The number of credits students were required to get each semester was changed in 2014, creating a new system including both student and faculty input that many thought was more reasonable than the previous plan.
In an email to the Accent, Negrón stated this change and his opinions on the reasonableness of credit levels, saying that previously, students had been required to attend chapels or assemblies five to seven days a week to get the amount of credit necessary.
“In 2014, students and employees sat down to create a system that they believed was reasonable,” said Negrón. “The result was asking freshmen and sophomores to attend spiritual programming twice a week and juniors and seniors once a week. Is it unreasonable to ask students to attend one or two spiritual programs a week on a Christian campus? I ultimately have to say ‘no.’”
