Keep on Course

Keep on Course 

Well done! Today you will have received your results and we just wanted to say congratulations! This year has not been your typical student experience and you should be really proud of yourselves for sticking with it and trying your best.

Hopefully you’re happy with your results; however if not, then please don’t despair as you have options, and we are here to help!

If you would like guidance on how to appeal a mark, or what re-sit opportunities may be available to you, please contact our advice service.

What are the grounds for appeal? 

If you feel that you have in some way been disadvantaged during your studies and this is reflected in your results then you may have grounds for an academic appeal. 

For undergraduates, there are three main grounds for appeal; in short, these are:

1. Personal circumstances which had an adverse effect on your academic studies;
2. Defects or irregularities in the conduct of the assessments or in written instructions or in advice;
3. Evidence of prejudice, or of bias, or of inadequate assessment on the part of one or more of the examiners.

For research postgraduates, there is an additional ground:

1. Evidence that the supervision provided was inadequate and that there were exceptional reasons why this had not been reported by the student prior to the decision of the Examining Board.

Appeals Deadlines: 

Part 1 March 4^th  

Part 2 March 11^th

Postgraduate research students have 20 working days to appeal

Remember: The University will not accept an appeal if your only concern is that you disagree with the ‘academic judgement’ of the marker/s or the Examining Board.

The Safety Net adjustments

In a normal academic year, a student would only be entitled to an uncapped re-sit on a failed assessment if they have submitted and been granted special circumstances by their department. This, however, is no normal academic year.

Here are the key points you should be aware of…

• Special circumstances forms are no longer required for the rest of this academic year, and is instead automatically applied to all students.
• All students will be granted an automatic uncapped re-sit opportunity on FAILED or non-submitted assessments.
• Depending on your current year of study, some students will also be eligible for an uncapped re-sit on PASSED assessments.

How will the re-sits work?

• If you are in the final year of your course (PGT, 3rd year UG, 4^th year integrated masters etc.) when receiving your overall degree classification at the end of this academic year, you will be able to accept the mark as is or reject it and re-sit one or more assessments to improve your classification.
• If you are not in your final year, but your assessments will still count towards your overall degree (2^nd year UG, 2^nd & 3^rd year integrated masters, etc.), you will have the opportunity to request to re-sit any assessment or module, pass or fail.
• For any assessments that will not count towards your final degree class (this is for you, freshers), an uncapped re-sit opportunity will only be available on failed or non-submitted assessments.
• Any mark achieved during a re-sit will only stand if higher than the original mark you achieved – if you don’t improve your mark the second time, it won’t count, and the original mark will stay. 
• Students re-sitting a previously passed assessment will get ONE opportunity to do so in August 2021. You will only be able to re-sit at a later date than this if granted special circumstances at the time.

To discuss your options or for more information, please check out our Academic Appeals Guide here or contact an advisor, Phone: 01970 621712 Email: union.advice@aber.ac.uk.