Students who consider that their ability to study or their performance in (or their ability to attend) assessments such as University Examinations has been adversely affected by circumstances beyond their control, such as illness or attending the funeral of a close relative, should notify the Department as soon as possible and must submit a claim on on of these forms:
Documentary evidence must be provided and, in the case of illness, appropriate medical certificates are required.
Certificates from medically qualified relatives are not normally accepted as evidence. Neither are notes which state that a patient was not ill when seen but had reported to the practitioner that they had been unwell previously.
The information provided with the claim is considered by the Department's Mitigation Committee which reports to the Boards of Examiners (which meet at the times specified elsewhere in this Handbook) to consider the results of the Sessional and Final Examinations.
Applications should be made on submission of the assessment or exam or as soon as possible thereafter (normally within 1 working day). Applications made more than 10 working days after the student 's circumstances have returned to normal will be deemed invalid unless the delay was beyond their reasonable control.
The University Guidelines for Mitigation Committees state that:
The Committee makes decisions by allocating a code to each claim. Students are notified of these outcomes by email within five working days of the meeting. Codes normally used are:
| Code | Ref. | Decision |
|---|---|---|
| IIE | N/A | Invalid claim; the claim is excluded by University Guidelines and/or the evidence provided was insufficient to support it. |
| ILT | 21.2 | Invalid claim; it was received too late. |
| NNA | 21.1 | Claim noted but no action taken/required. |
| VNA | 21.1 | Valid claim, no action. (The circumstances of the claim did not directly affect the outcome of an assessment.) |
| VMM | 21.3 | Valid claim and a mark will be awarded in line with the Department's Missing Marks Procedure and will appear on the transcript. |
| VAM | 21.4 | Valid claim, affected mark(s) will be increased in line with Department policy, normally by 5% |
| VDF | 21.5 | Valid claim, a deferred assessment is permitted. (Normally during the summer resit week.) |
| VIG | 21.6 | Valid claim, the assessment mark or module mark will be ignored for the purposes of classification and/or condonement. |
| VDE | 21.7 | Valid claim, deadline extended. The mark will be recorded on the transcript. |
| VWR | N/A | Valid claim, warning revoked. (The automatic Department's Warning Form was inappropriate.) |
The references in the above table are to the applicable paragraphs in the University Guidelines for Mitigation Committees.
A student who has been absent or adversely affected because of illness or other circumstances beyond their control should consult the Mitigating Circumstances Flowchart to find out what type of certification will be required by the University.
The Department follows the University's Student Illness Procedures. These strictly limit the circumstance in which extensions to submission deadlines are possible, e.g.:
The Student Health Centre have their own guidelines conerning when they will issue sickness certificates. A student who has been absent from classes for between four (one in the case of students On Report) and six consecutive days must complete and return a completed:
copies are also available from Services office. A medical professional's certificate is required for:
In case 'b' above, the certificate must normally be obtained within 24 hours of the affected examination or deadline.
See also: Procedures for Handling Missing Marks.
The Department will need to inform the Registry when a student has been absent for more than 20 working days, and the Academic Division will notify the appropriate authorities (Student Finance England, LEA, NHS, etc.).
A student who has been persistently absent for reasons of illness may be required (in writing) to obtain a doctor's certificate in respect of any subsequent absences; the student will need to present the Department's letter to the medical practitioner in order to obtain the required certificate.