Examination¶
Examinations are a core part of assessment for physics courses at UTAS, and their structure governed by the Assessment and Results Procedure policy. At the discipline level, exams are pretty malleable; however, there are some core principles to which one must adhere. This page aims to provide information on preparing an exam, as well as what to expect throughout the teaching period in relation to examination.
Almost all information regarding examination comes from the "Executive Officer - Teaching & Communications", which in 2021 was Helena Montauban, with the other bits of information coming from (the Associate Head of) Learning and Teaching, Ashley Edwards.
Staff changes
As of the time of writing, Helena is no longer the executive officer, which may change things into the future
Exam preparation¶
Examination structure¶
The exact form of the exam will depend on what is requested: invigilated face-to-face exams are no longer the default mode. Request an invigilated exam (Due Friday 20th August)
no restrictions on the type of calculator and students taking in 2-sides of an A4 sheet of notes into the exam then all is sorted. They are the typical allowed materials that we try to be consistent with across physics units, so while we can make them different the preference is not to.
Executive Officer - Teaching & Communications Helena Montauban
Examination template¶
Examination submission¶
Upload to the SNS Dropbox exams folder, which should be emailed out at some point by Helena.
Unable to upload
In order to upload an exam to the dropbox, one must have the appropriate privileges. These should be granted during one's induction; however, if like me that did not happen, you should email Helena and request the appropriate privileges be allocated. In my case, I requested to join the SNS Dropbox team, which was not the correct thing to do, but I was accepted into the team, and thus was able to upload my exam.
Exam day¶
Results¶
How do I get my exams?¶
Mark collection and collation¶
Discipline assessors meeting¶
Rounding of 9s
Post exam¶
Supplementary and deferred examinations¶
Certain students may be eligible for a supplementary or deferred examination, usually referred to as supp and DO (Deferred Ordinary) exams respectively. Supplementary exams can be granted to students with an otherwise good record but fail the exam, but must approved by the College on the recommendation of the assessment committee. Deferred examinations are replacement exams for students that cannot sit the original exam. An example situation giving rise to this would be a student having a car accident on their way to the examination1, and in these circumstances, you can point the student to the exam deferral page and/or link them directly to the application for deferred examination form.
The processes for examination is very similar to the primary examination, with the difference being a more compressed timeline.
Do I need to write a second exam?
I put this question to the discipline meeting, and the uniform response was no, giving the original exam is fine. I am not sure that I am on board with this, as whilst the examinations are not available, a 5 minutes conversation with any other student could produce a near-perfect counterfeit exam paper.
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This is exactly what happened to one of my students! ↩