Attendance and Compulsory Sessions


The Faculty expects you to attend your academic contact hours. You should treat all teaching and learning activities as mandatory. Your attendance is monitored by the Faculty. This enables you to participate in the required learning and teaching activities of your modules, and to complete your assignments and examinations on time. If you do not attend two consecutive sessions in any given module, you will be contacted by email.

If you are experiencing an illness or other personal difficulties that may affect your attendance or performance, you should discuss this with your Personal Academic Tutor as soon as possible. In more serious circumstances, you may need to discuss coursework extensionsspecial considerations and/or the suspension of your programme.

Please click here to view the University’s policy on Attendance.

 
 

Attendance Expectations in Education

In the Education School it is expected that every student will achieve a minimum attendance rate of 80% in each module’s teaching sessions and will attend all assessments except in exceptional circumstances.

Teaching sessions: It is anticipated that students will only miss teaching sessions due to circumstances beyond their control such as illness, medical appointments, or other problems which have to be dealt with immediately. Out of courtesy you should e-mail the module tutors for sessions you miss (preferably beforehand) to explain the reasons for absence (and you should copy in your personal tutor and the Programme Director in any such correspondence). You must also submit the appropriate absence form (see Hub forms store) and return this to the Admin Office promptly on your return to University.

Assessment sessions (e.g. examinations, in-class presentations): You are only likely to miss scheduled assessments in exceptional circumstances. In cases such as these you must contact your personal tutor urgently. If you are unable to contact your personal tutor then you must contact the Admin Office immediately. It is important that someone knows of your problems so that you can be given quick and appropriate advice;

Please note that no one should miss any teaching or assessment sessions due to family holidays, and paid or voluntary work commitments;

In all teaching sessions a register will be taken and absences will be recorded on your file. Attendance is of increasing importance to employers in a reference and so these records will be used to indicate to an employer whether your attendance record is good or not. It should also be noted that non-attendance can threaten your progress and achievement on the programme, and may even lead to your having to leave the University.

 
 

Compulsory Sessions in Psychology

In some Psychology modules, attending sessions is compulsoryThe reason is that, unless you attend these sessions, it is impossible for you to attain the intended learning outcomes of these units. This happens in modules where the sessions involve students engaging in hands-on, interactive, and collaborative training or small group tutorials.

It may also be compulsory to attend sessions in Year Three option units, depending on the wishes of the Module Lead.

In general, however, it is not compulsory to attend sessions on purely lecture-based modules. This is because it is possible, in principle, to attain the intended learning outcomes of a module without attending those lectures. Nonetheless, you are still strongly advised to attend such lectures. If you do not, you will make it much more difficult for yourself to attain the learning outcomes of the unit.

Usually, all sessions in a module are either compulsory as a whole or not compulsory as a whole. However, it may occasionally happen that only a subset of sessions are deemed compulsory.

Module Leads will notify students in advance as to whether each module contains compulsory sessions, and in-class roll calls will in any case be taken.

PLEASE NOTEIf you are absent from three compulsory sessions on the same module without a valid reason, then your marks for the module will be capped at 40%, and further disciplinary action may follow.

Note too that, if you miss too many compulsory sessions from a module, even for valid reasons, you may still fail to meet the learning outcomes of a module, which require attendance. Hence, you may have to achieve those outcomes a different way, for example, through the completion of alternative work assigned by a unit instructor.

Every time you are absent from a compulsory session—and have not yet notified the Academic Unit—you are liable to receive an automated warning by email. (Note: given the automated nature of the system, you may receive such an email even if you have a valid reason for being absent, or even if your absence has in fact been authorized. In such cases, do not worry: the matter will be sorted out shortly, or will have already been sorted out.)

Absence from Compulsory Sessions

If you are absent from a compulsory session, here is what you should do.

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