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Mitigation not Agitation…
Or why you don’t need to worry about that big fat zero
Here we are again at the time of year when exams and assessments are uppermost in everyone’s minds – or are they? Probably, despite all the hard work you’ve put in this semester, some of you are now coping with events in your own lives which make academic assessments pale into insignificance by comparison. Perhaps you’ve had a bereavement, or are supporting members of your family who are ill or in difficulties of some kind, perhaps you are unwell yourself; there can be any number of reasons why your academic performance may not be up to scratch just when you want to do your best.
If you’re a hard-working and well-motivated student you may decide to put your head down and keep going anyway. When everything is just too much to cope with there’s also a temptation to put your head back under the duvet and hope it will all go away. Perhaps it’s just something that’s too difficult to talk about and you don’t want disclose it, even at the risk of failing. This is a Bad Idea. It’s a particularly Bad Idea because if you don’t apply for mitigation at the time of your original assessment it may count against you later if/when you need to appeal. You would then have to provide convincing reasons why you didn’t disclose your mitigating circumstances at the appropriate time. Remember that you can always ask for your mitigation and evidence to be considered in confidence.
The change in the Academic Regulations has meant that a lot more students than previously have been appealing recently. Over the last three months we’ve seen lots of students with strong cases for appeal who would have been given mitigation if they’d come forward at the time of their first assessment, saving themselves a lot of worry and ensuring that they had another uncapped attempt. One reason it seems some of you don’t apply for mitigation is that you are frightened of seeing a big fat zero appearing on e-vision as a result.
Don’t be. OK, so the rules about mitigation which came in at the start of the last academic year mean that even if you pass the assessment you requested mitigation for your mark will be annulled, so the prospect of seeing that zero on your transcript is pretty scary, isn’t it? Hardly surprising you keep your fingers crossed and hope for the best even when you know it’s all too much. Like most of one’s fears, though, it’s not as bad as it sounds. If your mitigation is accepted you will just be asked to re-submit your coursework at a later date and then it will be treated as a first, uncapped attempt. In the case of an exam, you’ll have another opportunity to take it again as an uncapped attempt, so in either case you get another two attempts – one uncapped, the second capped. Yes, it might turn out that your mitigation is rejected and your mark stays at zero even though you passed and that’s why you might need advice about your grounds for mitigation. But in most cases students considering mitigation have valid reasons for seeking it and with the right evidence there should be no problem.
So why might yours fail? Sometimes students don’t realise that just telling your pathway leader or personal tutor about your problems is not enough; you need to see your Faculty Student Adviser for the appropriate form. But the most common reason is that students don’t submit evidence, or the evidence they do submit is not explained enough to make the situation clear. In such cases, even if you put your mitigation in within the five working days of your due date, if you don’t provide convincing evidence of your circumstances it won’t be accepted. If you were ill, for example, you need a doctor’s note verifying that s/he saw you on or near the time of assessment. It’s important that your evidence is time-relevant – it’s no good submitting evidence that refers to a bad bout of athlete’s foot four months before you were due to hand the work in. Joking apart, if you’re not sure what evidence to provide of your mitigating circumstances, discuss the situation with your Faculty Student Adviser, or make an appointment with one of us here at the Students’ Union Advice Service. We have the experience to offer you the advice you need and it’s free, completely confidential and impartial. We can give you a face-to-face or telephone appointment. We have two main offices; in Chelmsford, tel: 01245 258 178, and in Cambridge, tel: 01223 460 008. Don’t get agitated or put your head in the sand – get advice and get mitigated!