SELCS

Penalties for late submission of coursework

In August 2010, UCL Academic Committee circulated rules concerning the late submission of assessed coursework, including dissertations. For the purposes of the School, these rules, which apply equally to work submitted electronically or in hard copy, may be summarized as follows:

  • If you submit a piece of coursework after the deadline but within 24 hours of the deadline, your mark will be reduced by 5 percentage points.
  • If you submit a piece of coursework during the following six days, your mark will be reduced by a further 10 percentage points. For example, if your essay is due by 16.00 on Tuesday and you submit it at 15.30 on Thursday, your essay will incur a 5-point penalty because you failed to submit it within 24 hours of the deadline (i.e. by 16.00 on Wednesday) plus an additional 10-point penalty. However, if your original mark is above the passmark (40% for undergraduate coursework and 50% for postgraduate coursework), the penalty for late submission will not reduce it below 40% (for undergraduate coursework) or 50% (for postgraduate coursework).
  • Coursework submitted later than seven days after the deadline, providing that it is submitted before the end of the second week of Term 3 for undergraduate courses or by a date during Term 3 defined in advance by the relevant Master’s Board of Examiners for postgraduate taught programmes, will be awarded a mark of zero but will be considered to be complete, provided the coursework contains material that can be assessed.
  • If you fail to submit a piece of coursework, your result for the course will be deemed 'incomplete', unless the coursework in question represents less than 20% of the overall course assessment. If the coursework is less than 20% of the overall course assessment, your mark of 0% will be one of the marks used to calculate your overall mark for the course. 
  • If you submit a dissertation or a project report more than seven days late but before the end of the second week of Term 3 for undergraduate modules or by a date defined in advance by the relevant Master’s Board of Examiners for postgraduate taught programmes, it will be awarded a mark of zero and the assessment will be considered to be complete, provided the dissertation or report contains material that can be assessed.
  • If the School Examinations Tutor (or Graduate Tutor for MA students) grants you an extension without penalty for a piece of coursework, he or she will set you a new deadline for that piece of work. The penalties described above will come into effect if you overshoot this revised deadline. Please note that only the School Examinations Tutor/Graduate Tutor can grant extensions.

Worked Example

An essay due in at 16.00 on Monday 1 April is handed in at 15.00 on Tuesday 2 April. It is marked as normal and awarded an agreed mark of 63%. Because it is less than 24 hours late, it incurs a penalty of 5 percentage points, which reduces the mark to 58%.

If the same essay were handed in at 15.00 on Monday 8 April and achieved the same initial mark of 63%, it would incur a further penalty of 10 percentage points, which would make the final mark 48%.