Division International Studies

Exam time! Easily to recognize by shadows swishing swiftly over campus, to the library back and forth, becoming paler and thinner by the day. Students all of sudden experience their lecturers for the time of an exam as grumpy invigilators, snapping at any whisper in the classroom and checking endlessly dictionnaries. And after the exam the lecturers run off with those big packs of exam scripts clutched fiercely under their arm. What do they do with them? Do you know what happens to your exam script once you have given it truthfully into the hands of the invigilators?

Well, first the exam scripts are brought back to the Faculty Office where they are counted and checked. Then they are sent to the module convenor who will start marking them right away as turnover times at UNNC are less than a week even for very big classes. Every division has its marking criteria defined in its Student Handbook or, in the case of the Division IS, in the Essay Writing Guide.  Although formulated slightly differently, marking criteria across the divisions take into consideration three features of the exam: the sophistication and clearness of the argument, the written presentation and the knowledge base demonstrated in the exam answers. In order to make sure that marking is fair, exam scripts are marked anonymously and moderated where necessary. “Moderation” is how we call the process by which scripts are second marked and checked upon by the external examiner. The marking procedure at the Division IS complies with all criteria set out in the Quality Manual of the University of Nottingham on assessments: http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/quality-manual/assessment/index.htm

In the entire process the roles of the exams officer and of the external examiner are crucial. The exams officer actually organizes the entire process of examination in the division. She, in this case Dr. Rosaria Franco, manages the setting of exam questions and supervises the marking process, assembles the marks and prepares the internal exam board. The external examiner is a senior academic colleague appointed from a third university (in our case the UG EE is from the University of Liverpool and the PG EE from the University Hamburg).  Before the exams ,he/she checks the question to see whether they are consistent with what was taught in the module, if they are clearly and unambiguously formulated and if they give all students a fair chance to succeed in the exam. She/he furtheron checks the marks and the marking procedure for all modules. From every module we second mark about 10% of the scripts which are usually the borderline cases (49, 59, 69), all firsts and all fails. Second marking is also anonymous and marks are discussed between the first and second marker. If after the second  marking student marks are still borderline, fail or first, these scripts are sent to the EE together with the essays. The role of the EE is not only to take a final and usually binding decision but also to check if marking was fair and consistent across all modules and within one module. If the borderline, fail and first scripts do not represent 10% of the class, the exam officers sends more sample scripts to the EE, usually by picking some from the range of the 40, of the 50s and 60s. The EE compares with the module handbook and the class readings and material, and then comments on the marks, the exams and our comments to essays and exams. The marks confirmed and signed off by the EE are final. Marks cannot be appealed and this for the good reason that the anonymity of the marking, the second marking and external marking procedure are seen as sufficient safeguards against arbitrariness or unfairness.

Module convenors, too, pay extreme attention to their marking in order to remain fair and just in their judgments. Experience teaches them to look a second time at scripts they have given extraordinary low or extraordinary high marks, and they will, besides the formal second marking procedures, seek advice with colleagues, the exam officer or the Head of Division in cases of doubt. Lecturers in our division also devote much time to writing essay and exam feedback in order to show students ways to improve their performance. The advice for essay writing, exam preparation and dissertation writing we give you in the study skills series (available in the Faculty Office) results from this experience. The aim of our marking is to help students improve their study experience and to show us their best.

Global Governance graduate Du Ran with the Head of Division International Studies,wearing the UNNC MA gown: black gown, Edinburgh style black hood with light blue and carlett lining.

Saturday saw the first graduation ceremony for our MA Global Governance students. In black gowns with black hoods which are lined in light blue students received the congratulations of the President of UNNC, Professor Yang Fujiya and the Provost, Professor Roger Woods, as well as of their Head of Division, Dr. Catherine Goetze.
For some the professoral procession into the hall at the sound of Georg Friedrich Haendel’s Water Music seems like a peculiar form of carnival, for others it constitutes one of the most solemn moments of their lives. But where does this tradition of procession, congregation, and gowns come from? Read the rest of this entry »

It is this time of the year again, when Chinese students all over the country are applying en masse to post-graduate studies in the UK. Requests for references pile up on the desks of teaching staff and email boxes are full with anxious emails “Dear Professor, did you write…”, “Dear Doctor… I would like to apply, can you kindly” and so on. Nervous students sit in the office hours, clinging to their folders in which they have neatly filed printouts from the webpages of the universities to which they want to apply. Yet, when asked what exactly they want to do, why they want to do a post-graduate degree and what they expect from post-graduate studies, students more often than not give you a blank look. Better job chances, the reputation of the universities, and the parents’ will are sometimes mentioned but overall, very often students do not seem to have very clear ideas of what they want to achieve with post-graduate studies. Even the question if they really need post-graduate studies remains unanswered. A couple of weeks ago I had a student in my office who had a wonderful plan of what she would like to do after her studies but as all her classmates were applying for post-graduate studies she felt that she needed to do so, too, even though this would not contribute anything to her original career plan. Read the rest of this entry »