Interruption of Study & Return to Study Process Recap

Interruption Applications  

Students who wish to apply for a first or second period of interruption must do so via the My Studies section of their Portico accounts. The student should have a meeting with the relevant colleagues in their department before the application is approved by the department and/or faculty via Portico. Please note, interruptions cannot be backdated and should be approved as soon as possible after the student has submitted the application.  

Guidance, training materials and key information for the Portico Interruption of Study procedures and workflow can be found on the Interruptions Support webpages.  

Please refer to the Interruption Regulations for details on the categories of interruption and guidance for staff.  

Return to Study - January Returners 

Student Records are currently carrying out data checks on the records for students who are expected to return in January, to ensure students who have indicated their intention to return are able to re-enrol for term 2. Students will be sent further information shortly on the re-enrolment process.  

It is essential that the following Return to Study process is followed, to ensure there are no delays to a student’s re-enrolment following their interruption.  

Return to Study Process 

Students are contacted three months in advance of their return to study date and are asked to respond to a questionnaire via Portico indicating their intention to either return to their studies, apply for a further period of interruption or withdraw from the course. For each option, the process is as follows: 

• a) Student indicates their intention to return and does not require a welfare review with the Student Support and Wellbeing team. The department or faculty do not need to take any action. Once the student has indicated their intention to return, the record will be automatically updated to Expected to Enrol with a start date equal to the date of their return. The student will be sent information on when and how to re-enrol. If a visa is required, the student can submit a CAS request form to the Visa Compliance team once their status is Expected to Enrol.  

• b) Student indicates their intention to return and requires a welfare review. The student will be sent an email asking them to contact SSW to arrange a welfare review. The SSW team will indicate the outcome of the review via the Portico workflow and faculty should then confirm their approval of the student’s return. The record will be automatically updated to Expected to Enrol with a start date equal to the date of their return. 

• c) Student indicates their intention to apply for a further period of interruption. Students are permitted a maximum of two periods of interruption, but please refer to the guidance for full details on the categories and durations of interruptions. Once the student has indicated their intention to apply for a further interruption, they must also apply for another interruption via the My Studies section of their Portico account. If they do not, their record may be closed if they fail to return from their current period of interruption.  

• d) Student indicates their intention to withdraw. We do not require an additional C2RS application if a student indicates their intention to withdraw following an interruption of study. No further action is required from the department or faculty. Student Records will close the record and send confirmation via email.  

Module updates 

Module registrations may be updated on the student’s record as part of the Return to Study process, however, this is dependent on the actions on assessments that are indicated as part of the interruption application process. Please refer to the guidance for further information.  

Departments and/or Student Records may need to make amendments to a student’s module registrations dependent on the timing of the student’s interruption and/or their return. Please liaise with your Student Records contacts via your Query Management log if you have any questions about a student’s module registrations.  

How to track the status of your students’ applications 

The Portico task allows you to check the status of each students’ application, from submission through to the end of the process.  

In the ‘Interruption of Study – Open Applications’ container, once an application is submitted, you can review the submitted date, the start and end dates of the interruption, the category of the interruption and status e.g. department review or department reviewed (awaiting faculty review).  

In the ‘Interruption of study – Students Currently on Interruption’ container, you can view the date the application was approved, the start and end dates of the interruption, the category of interruption and the status. In this container you can also check the Return to Study status for each application, under the following columns:

Welfare Review 

• A status of ‘Not Required’ indicates the student does not need to have a welfare review.  

• A status of ‘SSW Review Required’ indicates the student needs to complete their welfare review with the SSW team and/or the SSW team have not updated the outcome of the meeting via Portico.  

• A status of ‘Faculty Approval Required’ indicates that the SSW team has updated the outcome of the SSW review on Portico, but the Faculty approval is outstanding.  

• A status of Faculty Approved indicates that the faculty has updated the Portico task with their approval for the student to return.  

Student’s Intention 

• A status of ‘Not Known Yet’ indicates that the student has not yet indicated their intention.  

• A status of ‘Returning’ indicates the student has completed the questionnaire and intends to return to their studies at the end date of their interruption. 

• A status of ‘Withdrawing’ indicates the student does not want to return from their period of interruption and is withdrawing from their programme of study. 

• A status of ‘Further Interruption’ indicates the student intends to apply for a second, consecutive interruption. 

You can export CSV downloads from each of the containers in the Portico task, to help you track a range of data, such as start and end dates, approval dates, SSW status and student intentions.

Frequently Asked Questions 

The FAQ section on the Interruptions Support webpages has been updated based on your feedback over the past few months. Please review these, as they cover a range of tasks relating to the Interruption and Return to Study processes.  

These are under constant review, so please let us know if there is anything additional you would like to be included.  

Further updates to the Interruptions Process 

The new interruptions workflow was launched in the Spring of 2021 and so far, we have had over 2000 entries into the Portico process.  

Thank you to all of you for your engagement with the new process and for your feedback, which is essential to help us ensure any technical or procedural issues are resolved and to help us shape any future developments that may be required.  

We are currently working on fixes for some known issues, including: 

• Applications missing from the ‘Interruption of Study-Students Currently on Interruption’ container 

• Automated updates to the student record – ensuring the correct data is reflected  

• Restricting the option for new students, prior to the enrolment deadline, to apply for an interruption of study 

• Restricting the option for students who have passed their programme end date, but are on extensions due to deferrals/resits, to apply for an interruption of study 

We will provide further updates on any future developments/fixes, but please continue to let us know if you experience any issues with the Portico process or if you have any questions about the workflow or the regulations.

For further information please log a query via your Faculty Query Management Log or email examboards@ucl.ac.uk (staff only).