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As part of our Faculty Education Plans (FEP), we have in recent years established baselines and actions to improve student satisfaction with Assessment and Feedback within our departments.
Feedback timeliness
- Assessment deadlines and dates that marks and feedback will be returned should be clearly communicated to students at the start of the module.
- Staff should allocate time in their diaries to do their marking so that they can meet the deadline (this should be within 20 UCL working days of assessment submission).
- Staff should request help, if required, to ensure that the marking is carried out on time (although note that markers must always be trained, and a clear set of marking criteria provided).
- If feedback return is unavoidably delayed (e.g., due to illness or caring responsibilities) then students must be informed of the delay as soon as possible and an approximate new return date communicated (UCL guidance states one additional week).
- Remind students of the UCL standards for return of feedback (within 20 UCL working days) or your own departmental standards if they differ. This is to calibrate student expectations.
- Clarify to students your departmental processes for raising issues with delayed feedback and who they should talk to about this. You may want to work with your student reps on this.
Feedback quality and usefulness
- Communicate to students how and when they will receive the two types of feedback (Mark Justification and Developmental Feedback) and explain whether they will receive this individually or as a group (or both).
- If appropriate, you can use this template to provide Developmental Feedback during (or at the end of) the module. This is especially important for modules assessed at the end of the term or in the exam period, as students will not receive any feedback associated with marks (Mark Justification) until a long time after the module is delivered.
- If appropriate, you can use this template to provide whole class Mark Justification feedback explaining where marks were gained and lost (e.g., common misunderstandings) but also point out what students could work on to improve. Of course, continue to provide individual feedback comments if you already do!
Support for assessment
- Our faculty policy so far has focussed on support for exams as these are the most common assessment type across most departments. The development of this baseline is described in a submission to the 2022 UCL Education Conference.
- For full guidance please see Support for Exam Preparation: a Guide for Students.
- As a baseline, students should expect access to one past (or mock / indicative) exam paper that demonstrates content, format and style of the exam they will sit this year.
- They should have access to some indicative answers for this paper that are detailed enough to show distribution of marks, depth of answer required and any flexibility in the mark scheme / acceptance of alternative answers.
- The department should communicate clearly to students their policy on availability of past exam papers.
- Clear written guidance should be provided to students about when and how they can access dedicated exam support, such as in office hours, revision workshops or Moodle forums.