Grades of 47.5 can be rounded up to a pass for this semester, according to a staff memo on Covid-19 special consideration.
University staff received a memo on 28 April with details of the special consideration they can apply to students. The memo was sent to all academic staff by Academic Deputy Vice-Chancellor Pat Cragg.
Some of these measures apply to all students to recognise “the standard level of disruption across cohorts” due to Covid-19.
All students who would be “marginally failing” a particular paper, with a ‘raw’ mark of 47.5 or higher, will have their marks rounded up to 50. That will apply unless there are “compelling reasons not to do so” (emphasis added by the University).
The memo states that “this should be applied to all relevant students in the paper; not to some students and not others”. The University considers that grades within 2.5 marks of passing are within the “margin of error” and should be rounded up as a result.
The other measure that might help all students, regardless of their circumstances, is scaling. Every paper except those in HSFY will be scaled (i.e. the grades adjusted up) if the marks are “very unusual compared to previous years”. The University intends to release further advice on this later in the year.
“Please note that this kind of scaling is not recommended for HSFY papers, as it may impact unduly on competitive entry to professional programmes,” the memo stated.
Special consideration for final exams will be available for reasons such as bereavement. It will also be available for significant Covid-19 impairment in terms of either technology issues or illness. Students are able to make applications through eVision.
Special consideration for internal assessments is a bit broader. For internals, the Covid-19 reasons for special consideration includes technological issues, a late start to the semester (due to being overseas), essential worker obligations, “very significant stress”, and a lack of the usual disability arrangements.
It is not clear whether those broader considerations can be applied to final exams as well as internal assessments. The considerations appear under the heading “Special consideration in Internal Assessment” but the phrase “standard circumstances for Special Consideration” is hyperlinked to the University’s policy on final exams.
Retrospective special consideration, for assignments already completed, is available but difficult to get. It can only be given out if “the student in question was clearly significantly more impacted than other students and that this can be documented”.
The University is also allowing more flexibility in the use of medical certificates. If a student cannot provide a medical certificate, another form will be provided to them as a “health declaration”. The memo states that if “independent evidence of impairment is required, the department should also consider whether requiring such evidence may place additional and unnecessary strain on essential services”.
Students working on dissertations or research papers can get an extension of up to two months if their work has been disrupted by Covid-19. This option is the University’s preferred approach. The other option is sending a special notice to the examiner explaining the disruption to their research.