U-turn over dissertation presentations cancellations

Final year English students have been informing that their dissertation presentations are no longer cancelled.

The email comes just 24 hours after receiving notification that they were no longer being assessed due to a marking boycott.

On Friday afternoon students received an e-mail from the module convenor for the English finalist year dissertation, Julian  North, notifying them that “due to the present industrial action we will not be able to assess dissertation presentations”.

Leicester is one of 69 universities taking part in the marketing boycott to protest pension changes.

For this year’s English finalists, the dissertation module would have been solely assessed on the written dissertation itself. The decision eradicated any chance for students to boost their mark of their dissertations as the presentation could only have raised the overall marks.

The cancellation announcement came just two weeks before the allocated dates for the delivery of the presentations and many had already put in hours of work.

Students were told that if they wished to do so, they could still deliver their presentations but only receive to ‘informal verbal feedback’ with no assessment will take place.

Earlier this evening however, finalists received a second email with instruction to “ignore the announcement sent out on Thursday”. Due to a notification that the marking boycott is likely to be lifted next week, the assessed presentations will now take place as normal.

A finalist English student who wished to remain anonymous told us:

“It’s a shame that the department seems in such a mess and that they couldn’t make sure the decision was final or not before they panicked/upset us all! It doesn’t give me much confidence in the system to be honest.”

It is understood that a number of students replied to the original email to complain about the decision.

The department’s U-turn took place in under 24 hours.

Earlier this month English students were e-mailed to be told that in light of the recent call for action from the University and College Union and ‘difficult circumstances’ assessments may not be returned within the three week deadline.

Head of School Julie Coleman acknowledged ‘clearly you will have strong feelings about this’ and encouraged students to ‘please make the most of your course reps… in ensuring that your views are represented’.