Well, naturally. You don't just hand out passes like Halloween Candy. Put it this way, I once had a Lit student who needed to passs. This student thought a Lit class was about him continuing his life-long attempt at making his iPhone love him. He failed twice. Third time came around, Uni asked me to "ensure" he passed. Now, I have made exams so easy they were not even exams, but in this case I contacted the student, told him which pages in the text book to read and then gave him the exam. I never told him the answers, but seeing as this chap was a plot of land, mortar, insulation material and all the bricks short of a house, I needed to work within very limited parameters. He passed the exam with a 68, but at least he did get enough questions right. I also checked with the Uni. My class was the only one he had not passed. I love my job and, despite the strenuous efforts of China, have managed to maintain a shaky hold on my ideals which are, admittedly, a mite frayed around the edges. Ideals are good, but cold, stark realism with a dash of compassion might help too. I was reminded of myself in Elementary school, 9th grade. Pretty decent in all classes except math and physics. Had a notorious tendency to completely muck up any experiment, respond to any question about physics with a glazed stare whilst making a confused "nghh...meeeeh...geeehhh" sound and would sometimes fall asleep. My physics teacher made me sit in the front row and every class would ask me incredibly leading questions. I ended up with a 7. In Denmark a fail is , pass is 6, so 7 is not exactly Rhodes Scholar material. I was not a slacker nor incredibly stupid, apart from physics, and my teacher knew this. So he "made" me pass, instead of letting one single class have a rather unpleasant consequence for me later on. I opted for the same solution with the Lit student. This boy was never going to be snapping at the heels of Harold Bloom, but I saw no reason to get on m academic high horse and destroy his future over his inability to remember the difference between Beowulf and Sir Gawain.
So, in the case of the OP's problem, my recommendation would be a carefully crafted test which aimed at whatever level the student is. No-one should ever, ever give a student a free pass, but one can make the work for the one student a bit easier. I would not do this at home but here in China, as stated, in order to not go crazy, we either chuck it in and or we allow those sterling ideals to become a little worn. Oh dear, long rant...sorry about that
