Universities warned not to drop examination standards in light of UCU strikes

While the University and College Union (UCU) have suspended industrial action for the foreseeable future, the Office for Students (OfS) has issued guidance for all universities to maintain academic standards under all circumstances when dealing with lost contact hours.

This new guidance asks universities not to put the “value of qualifications” at risk by awarding higher grades more generously in the knowledge that students will have lost contact hours a result of industrial action, especially to final-year students.

Instead, the government body has encouraged students to seek mitigation and apply for extenuating circumstances if they feel their work has been compromised.

This advice includes students requesting extensions for coursework or dissertation deadlines. Whilst the OfS has stated that students should make such requests individually, departments at the University of Warwick such as the English department had already granted coursework extensions prior to Friday’s ballot results.

According to Times Higher Education, it is estimated that half a million teaching hours were lost across the 65 universities during the 14 days of strikes.

The OfS’ guidance has been issued amidst concerns that universities will be compensating for strike action by generously awarding more first class and upper second-class grades, especially to final-year students who may not have been taught part of their course as a result of industrial action.

The higher education sector has already been warned about grade inflation after the OfS previously published guidance on 1 April to ensure that universities “meet certain conditions” and deliver “successful outcomes for all”.

According to Times Higher Education, it is estimated that half a million teaching hours were lost during the 14 days of strikes

The government body was criticised for this guidance earlier in the month by previous head of the Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education, Peter Williams. Mr Williams suggested that asking that universities ensure successful outcomes for all students was encouraging “dangerous” grade inflation and suggesting degrees to be “commodities to be bought and sold”.

The guidance was published by the OfS in order to inform institutions of the conditions that must be met for them to register with the new higher education regulator, who will be providing institutions with tuition fees and grant funding.

To meet the regulator’s new rules, universities must “deliver for all students successful outcomes which are valued by employers, or which enable further study” and “ensure that qualifications awarded hold their value over time, in line with recognised standards”.

However, Mr Williams expressed his fears that the wording of these conditions could imply that universities are now required to provide every student with a degree, or even guarantee a “good” degree, such as a first or a 2:1, given that this is now typically deemed “successful” in the eyes of most students and employers.

Mr Williams also added that the idea of universities being able to guarantee the value of their degrees in the future was “unrealistic”, and questioned whether the regulatory body understood the implications of its demand that “all” students achieve successful outcomes.