Coronavirus Recovery: advice and latest information

ECs for Final Assessments

If you are struggling and have circumstances that impact your ability to complete or submit your final assessments during the January 2023 Final Exam period, there are two options to consider. These options will apply to final assessments held for Semester 1 modules during the assessment period running from 9th - 27th January 2023.

For other coursework assessments, please follow the Continuous Coursework Extenuating Circumstances guidance and request Extenuating Circumstances through the Faculty Intranet.

Please see the summary of options below and read further to see details of what circumstances are eligible and how to apply for each option. For further detail, please also see the University Extenuating Circumstances guidance and also the Extenuating Circumstances and Financial Implications guidance available from Money@CampusLife.

Extenuating Circumstances Options During the January 2023 Exam Period

Option 1: Assessment Deferral

Students with eligible circumstances may apply to have any of the January 2023 Semester 1 Final Exams deferred. If approved, this gives students the option to defer one or more final assessments, and sit the deferred assessment in a future assessment period.
Non-final students who have approved deferrals will sit the deferred exams in the August 2023 Supplementary exam period.
Finalist students who have approved deferrals will have the option to request to sit the deferred exams in the May/June Final Exam period or the August 2023 Supplementary exam period. Your request should be specified in the submitted deferral request.

Option 2: Temporary Provisions

Temporary Provisions apply only to students who have sudden, short term conditions that impact them during the assessment period.
Please note that any temporary provisions agreed for either online or onsite exams will ONLY apply to the exam period in which provisions are requested.
Please note that any temporary provisions agreed for online exams will ONLY apply to assessments that are 24 hours or less in duration.

How to apply for Deferrals and Temporary Provisions

Final Assessment Deferrals

If your circumstances mean that you are struggling to complete an assessment, but you are not sure if it will qualify for a deferral request, please contact the Student Experience and Information Team so that we can advise.

Please see our Guide to Submitting a Deferral Request for step-by-step information on how to submit a request.

Steps to request deferral:

1. Complete the form:

To request assessment deferral, please complete the faculty Final Exam Deferral form via the Faculty Intranet. To access the form log in to the FSE Intranet and select the ‘Extenuating Circumstances’ tab on the homepage. You will then be able to select ‘Final Examination Deferral Form’ and follow the next steps to submit your request.
Requests must be submitted within 5 working-days (before or after) the assessment submission deadline. You can submit more than one deferral request, and the 5 working day deadline applies for each assessment you wish to defer. Late applications will not normally be accepted.

2. Provide supporting evidence: Outside supporting evidence is required if requesting deferral of exams, and we will not be able to review your request until we have received supporting evidence. When submitting your Final Examination Deferral request, please upload any supporting evidence you have to confirm your circumstances. If you are unable to submit evidence as part of your initial deferral request you will need to log back in to the Exam Deferral system and upload evidence at a later date (before the deadline for evidence submission).

Please note the deadline to submit evidence will be 31st January 2023, and we will not be able to consider any evidence or requests after this date.

Please see the information below regarding types of evidence that will be accepted.

3. Notification of outcome:

Your request will be reviewed once we have received your completed Deferral request form and supporting documentation. The Student Experience and Information Team will notify you of the outcome of your deferral request via your student email account, within 5 working days. If you do not receive a decision in 5 working-days, please contact the team at that point.

If your Deferral Request is approved for an assessment you have attempted, your assessment will not be marked and your final mark for the module will be based on the deferred assessment.

Non-final students who have approved deferrals will sit the deferred exams in the August 2023 Supplementary exam period.
Finalist students who have approved deferrals will have the option to request to sit the deferred exams in the May/June 2023 Final Exam period or the August 2023 Supplementary exam period. Your request should be specified in the submitted deferral request.

Temporary Provisions

Circumstances that are eligible:

Temporary Provisions apply for students who have sudden, short term conditions that occur during the exam period and disrupt your exams. This includes sudden onset medical conditions (broken limb, pregnancy, sight impairment, etc).

Please note that any temporary provisions agreed for either online or onsite exams will ONLY apply to the exam period in which provisions are requested, and ONLY to assessments that are 24 hours or less in duration. If you have ongoing long-term conditions that may impact you in future exams, we recommend that you contact the Disability or Wellbeing Services to discuss long term provisions to support you in future.

Steps to complete a Temporary Provision request for ONSITE, IN-PERSON exams:

1. To request Temporary Provisions, please email the MyUniHub Team via myunihub@swansea.ac.uk for guidance.

2. Provide supporting evidence: Outside supporting evidence is required if requesting Temporary Provisions, and your request will not be reviewed until you have provided supporting evidence. When contacting MyUniHub about your Temporary Provisions request, please also provide any supporting evidence you have to confirm your circumstances.

If you are not able to submit your evidence at the same time as your request, then please email MyUniHub via myunihub@swansea.ac.uk with your evidence as soon as possible.

3. Confirm provisions: If the request is approved, the MyUni Hub team will discuss what provisions will be possible for your onsite exams.

Steps to complete a Temporary Provision request for ONLINE exams:

1. To request Temporary Provisions, please complete the online Temporary Provisions of Exams form, provide supporting evidence via your form. Outside supporting evidence is required if requesting Temporary Provisions, and we will not be able to review your request until we have received supporting evidence.

2. Provide supporting evidence: Outside supporting evidence is required if requesting Temporary Provisions, and we will not be able to review your request until we have received supporting evidence. When submitting Temporary Provisions request, please also upload any supporting evidence you have to confirm your circumstances.

If you are not able to submit your evidence at the same time as your request, then please email the faculty Student Support team via StudentSupport-ScienceEngineering@swansea.ac.uk with your evidence as soon as possible.

3. Confirm provisions: If the request is approved, the faculty will discuss what provisions will be appropriate (either 25% Extra time, and/or possibly pre-booked Library PC spaces during the assessment period if available). If Extra Time is agreed, the release date and time for each eligible assessment will remain the same as originally timetabled, but your submission deadline will be adjusted to allow for the additional time provisions.

Important considerations and timing:

Please note that Extra Time may not be possible on short-notice, and we may require up to 2 working-days notice to put provisions in place once the request has been processed and approved. We will email your student email account to confirm which assessments will have provisions in place.

Please also note that for online provisions, Library PC spaces may not be available, and again we will need to consult with the Library team for this.

If the provisions that you need are not available, or if you do not feel that these provisions will be sufficient, then you will need to consider deferral instead.

Supporting Evidence

Outside evidence will be required if requesting deferral or temporary provisions for exams. Supporting evidence must be dated to within one month of the affected assessment or deadline, and must indicate how the circumstances have affected a student’s performance and/or may have affected a student’s ability to attend, complete, or submit an assessment on time.

All supporting evidence must be submitted as a Word document, JPEG or PDF. The university systems are not able to read supporting documents that are in HEIC format.

Supporting evidence must:
- Be supplied by a third party and submitted by the student.
- Clearly explain the circumstances.
- Confirm the time period affected by the circumstances.
- Be dated within one month of the affected assessment.
- Be submitted as soon as possible.
- Where documentation is written in a different language an official translation must be provided.
Examples of appropriate evidence are:
- Doctor’s letter or certificate.
- Hospital admission and discharge letter.
- Death Certificate / Order of Service / Funeral Director’s Letter.
- Police Report, a crime reference number on its own will not be sufficient.
The absence of any supporting documentation will result in the application being rejected unless the student can provide a satisfactory explanation in their application as to why they have been unable to provide such evidence. The University recognises that it will be difficult for some students to obtain evidence in the current climate and will consider applications sympathetically if appropriate explanation is provided.

For technical issues (ie. wifi/connection disruptions, access issue, etc) you will need to provide evidence to support your request. Evidence can include:

screenshots of error messages with a date/time indicated.
a dated service disruption notification.
an update from a network provider page.
communication outlining the disruption, including email or social media posts.
correspondence with a service provider or technical team to indicate the issue, date/time, and attempt to resolve the issue.

For a health or Wellbeing/mental health related circumstances, evidence can include:

A note from your doctor, GP or health centre indicating the circumstances and the dates affected.
A note from the central University Wellbeing or Welfare teams if you are getting support from these services.

For bereavement, we realise that this is a difficult time for everyone involved and that it can be difficult to obtain evidence. The types of evidence we can consider include, but are not limited to,
- A copy of a death certificate (if available).
- A copy of an order of service, or a funeral notice.
- If you find that a bereavement means that you are struggling with your Wellbeing or mental health, you may provide evidence of the Wellbeing/mental health issues rather than the actual bereavement (please see the notes above regarding supporting documents for health, Wellbeing/mental health circumstances).
- The above are just examples, and if you are struggling to obtain evidence, please do speak with a member of the Student Information Team.
If you test COVID positive, evidence will need to include:
- A photograph of your positive test with the test serial number clearly visible.
- Your positive test should be placed next to a note containing your student number, full name, date and signature attesting to the test being yours.

For other circumstances that are eligible, such as domestic arrangements or caring responsibilities, please try to describe the circumstances in as much detail as possible and provide as much evidence as you are able, and the Student Information Team will contact you if further evidence will be required.

If you are experiencing extenuating circumstances we would advise you to watch this video. If you have any questions please contact the Student Experience & Information Team for guidance.