13. Assessment

13.1. Written work

Work submitted for assessment in all subjects within the Faculty of Education must meet the requirements of satisfactory expression, presentation and referencing.

Students must show a satisfactory command of all elements of the conventions of written expression, including spelling, punctuation, sentence structure, paragraphing and text structure. If there are problems in any of these areas, it is the student's responsibility to put strategies in place to deal with these problems. The University's Learning Skills Unit, Ground Floor, 723 Swanston Street Carlton (Tel: +61 3 8344 0930) is able to help with these and other study-related problems.

Students should normally present word-processed assignments, except in the case of assignments involving scientific or mathematical notation, which may be hand-written. It is the student's responsibility to ensure the assignment is legible and clearly laid out.

All debts to works consulted in preparing assignments must be acknowledged, and a full bibliography of all such works must be included. Particular departments or lecturers may require particular referencing systems, notice of which will be given in the initial assessment statements in the subjects. Otherwise, any generally recognised, consistent system will be acceptable.

13.2. Policy on assessment of joint work

In an assignment in which it is indicated that joint work is permitted, more than one student may participate in the submission of an answer to that assignment. In such cases only one answer is to be submitted and it is to list names of all students who jointly worked on its preparation. If the assignment is for examination purposes the answer will be assessed as a whole and each student will receive the same mark.

13.3. Grading

The Faculty of Education is concerned to maintain an equitable grading system that clearly recognises and rewards different levels of achievement, and that is applied consistently across all departments of the Faculty. All subjects will be graded in accordance with the approved University scale (see Subject grades and marks).

A fail grade indicates that minimal standards have not been met in one or more of the following areas:

understanding of the subject matter
relevance to the topic
coherent development of ideas
expression
acknowledgment of sources.

A pass grade recognises work which competently meets all the requirements of the task. An honours grade recognises work in which the requirements of the task have been met more than competently. A first-class honours grade is reserved for outstanding work.

13.4. Late assignments and extensions

Students must make every effort possible to submit assignments by the due date. If a student believes she/he will not be able to complete the assignment in time because of unexpected circumstances, permission to submit late may be sought. The application for extension must be submitted, in writing, to the lecturer, giving reasons for the late submission. The application form is available at www.edfac.unimelb.edu.au/current students/resources. Extensions are granted at the discretion of the lecturer concerned.

The extension period will in no case exceed two weeks unless a formal application for special consideration has been lodged through the Student Information System (SIS) and the consideration granted by the lecturer. Please note that the submission of an application for special consideration does not mean that the application has automatically been approved. You should follow up the application with your lecturer(s) to find out whether special consideration has been granted, and to negotiate the variation to the subject requirements that might be allowed.

Applications for late submission should ideally be lodged in advance, although it is acknowledged that this may not always be possible.

Assignments submitted late without an extension having been granted will normally not be accepted.

If the lecturer does accept a late assignment for which no extension has been granted, it will be penalised five per cent of the total possible score for each working day late until pass level is reached, then marked to pass level. For example, if the piece of work is assessed out of 20, one mark per day will be deducted from the mark given, until a score of 10 is reached. After that, 10/20 will be the highest possible score.

13.5. Unsatisfactory assignments

When an assignment is not satisfactory, there are three categories which may apply:

Fail (ie. fail without right to resubmit)

In all such cases, the assignment will have received an independent second marking that is in agreement with the first assessment.

Resubmission (ie. fail with right to resubmit)

Resubmission is not to be regarded as an automatic right. The staff member will consider whether there is sufficient justification for allowing the student to resubmit.

When students are granted the right to resubmit, in normal circumstances they can receive only a pass grade (ie. 50 per cent).

Special resubmission

When students from a non-English first language background need additional development of their English language, sociocultural and/or learning skills, they may be granted a special resubmission, and be given the opportunity to rewrite the assignment. In such cases, the student can receive better than a pass grade (ie. the submission will be graded normally).

It is likely that a student granted a special resubmission will be advised to seek help from the Learning Skills Unit if she/he has not already done so.

Since students are expected to demonstrate developing capacity to handle assignments independently, the same student will not be regularly granted a special resubmission.

13.6. Withheld results (WH)

In Statements of Final Results in subjects, students may get a WH result. This means that assessment in the subject has not yet been completed because the student has been granted an extension, a resubmission, or is to be required to do additional work. If you receive a WH result and have not been granted an extension or been notified of what is required for you to pass the subject, you should immediately contact the lecturer-in-charge of the subject.

If a student has not submitted an assignment and not been granted an extension, she/he will be given a fail (N) result.

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