Students changing passwords

It seems like everyone's password is expiring lately and many are vexed trying to set up a new one. This may not be sound privacy policy, but I advise the frustrated ones to use their first initial capitalized, their last initial lowercase, and a 6 digit date they will remember (but not their birthday). They seem to be able to change it on the first try after those instructions.

As a reminder, the parameters for the password are

• 8 digits long
• at least 1 capital letter
• at least 1 number
• cannot have their name in it
• cannot be their previous two passwords

Personally, I keep a rotation of 3 passwords that I just keep going through...