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Assessment handbook

Assessment criteria

Generic assessment criteria to guide marking in qualitative and quantitative work at each level (3, 4, 5, 6, 7).

Marking Rubrics

Guidance on Marking Rubrics is available from the Centre for Higher Education Research and Practice.  See Academic Development - resources.

Assessment handbook

The first edition of the University's Assessment Handbook, endorsed by the then Teaching and Learning Committee, was published in 2001.

The Handbook has been compiled as a practical guide, to assist academic and other staff engaged in the assessment of students of the University or of its partner institutions.  It is intended to promote best practice.  Written at a general University level, it does not stand in isolation from faculty or subject-level policies and strategies which it complements.

The Working Group which compiled the Assessment Handbook undertook a review in 2002. Further editions were published in 2003, 2007 and annually since 2009.

The 2018 edition has now been published on the Academic Office website.  It is not being issued to all staff in hard copy.  This edition incorporates the following developments in 2017/18:

  • the Curriculum Design Framework and parameters (1.6, 1.7, 3.2);
  • new guidance on assessment rubrics (1.9, 14.4);
  • new guidelines on workload equivalences (2.1, 3.2, Appendix B1);
  • new policy on penalties for exceeding word limits (4, 14.3);
  • updated guidance on assessment of placement year (11.3 and Appendices H1 – 5) and study abroad (11.4 – 11.5, Appendix H6);
  • new algorithm for Honours degree classification (14.6);
  • updated Guidelines on Extenuating Circumstances, now Principles for Implementation (19.5).