As the COVID-19 crisis continues to affect different countries at different times and in different ways we are continuing to keep in contact with all students via our regular bulletins and dedicated messages for groups of students – including those of you on a semester/year abroad.
Following the communication last week to all students about arrangements for progression into the next academic year we wanted to clarify how this applies to your circumstances.
[You can review all of the student bulletins here]
For students who have chosen to complete their year abroad studies with their host institution, in country or at a distance.
You can and should continue to engage with your studies wherever this is practical – and it is important to remember that being “engaged with your studies” is a condition of continuing insurance cover.
However, we recognise that for many of you this may be difficult, for example, where classes and assessment conditions may be in another time zone. For this reason, and to ensure that students are under no additional pressure at this time, there is no obligation for you to complete the final assessments as required by your host institution in order to progress to your next year of study. For any assessments that have been completed, or any that are in progress, they will be treated as set out below to generate a progression mark.
All continuing students will be required to complete some “bridging coursework” as detailed below. But if you have completed your year abroad normally, in full, this requirement will be minimal.
For students where your semester/year abroad has been disrupted or curtailed meaning that you cannot complete this as planned.
You will be subject to the same exceptional arrangements for all continuing students to ensure that you can progress normally. Full details are available here. We aim to ensure that every student will progress to their next level of study.
In summary what this means is that we will use all available marks from any completed modules in this academic year to calculate a provisional progression mark. In order to calculate a provisional progression mark we will calculate a weighted average from your marks as follows:
- Include all marks from any completed modules in this academic year.
- In addition, include any marks from all individual pieces of completed work from across your modules in this academic year (e.g., if a piece of submitted coursework has been submitted that was worth 30% of the final module mark, that will be weighted 0.3).
- If you have limited or no credits from this academic year already secured you will be required, along with all other progressing students, to complete at least one, and no more than two, pieces of “bridging coursework” – as detailed below.
This means that you are not required to complete any further assessments set by the institution that has hosted you during your exchange. For any assessments that have been completed, or any that are in progress, they will be treated as set out above to generate a progression mark.
Bridging Coursework for all students:
In addition to ensuring we can calculate a provisional progression mark from this year, we also want to ensure you are as well prepared as possible for your next year of study. Each programme team is working on setting a specific piece of coursework for you to complete.
We recognise that the situation in which you are trying to complete this coursework is far from ideal – with restricted access to some resources and, in some cases, difficult personal circumstances – so your programme teams will be designing the coursework accordingly. Programme teams will also take into account any credit assessments you have already completed; and the Programme Learning Outcomes and professional body requirements in setting the bridging coursework. The requirement is that you must simply engage with and submit this coursework in preparation for your studies next year. Completion/submission of the work to the best of your ability will count as meeting the requirement.
**All students will receive details of their Bridging Coursework by the 15th May 2020 at the latest. The deadline for submission of the completed work is the 31st August 2020. **
** *Students studying on a LANS programme will be subject to different arrangements and you can expect to receive further information about this shortly.**
Finally, for all students –
Mitigation (or ‘no detriment’) at the conclusion of your overall programme:
When we reach the Exam Boards in Summer 2021 i.e., when you have completed your final year and your degree classification is to be determined, we will take the mean of your final year marks first, and only add the mean of relevant marks from earlier years into the calculation if it confirms or improves your degree classification. This is feasible because in our degree algorithm, the marks from your study abroad period count for a minority of your final degree classification so you will not be disadvantaged by these circumstances.
If you have a query about your academic progression after reading this message then you can contact your academic School. Contact details are available at our website, please see the section for Information if you are a second year UG student progressing to third year.
We share your disappointment that your semester/year abroad studies have been disrupted by the global COVID-19 crisis. If you have an outstanding claim for additional any costs arising from the disruption to your studies for consideration either by our insurers or by the University you must make sure to submit your claim within thirty days of the costs incurred or by no later than 30th May 2020. For any further advice or information you can always contact the Study Abroad Team.