Please note, a further update was sent out to all students on Thursday 19 March regarding graduation. This can be viewed here.
Over the last few days we have been moving our teaching and learning support online, seeking to move quickly in response to rapidly changing government and expert advice.
Information about our move to online teaching and learning support was provided on 17 March.
Our next priority has been to review the potential to move end of year exams and assessment online.
The decision has now been made that end of year exams and assessment will be conducted online. More detail about how online end of year exams and assessment will operate, will be shared by Friday 3 April. In making the decision to move to online exams and assessment, our goal is to seek to ensure that no student is academically disadvantaged as a direct result of coronavirus (Covid-19).
We understand that the decision to move to online exams and assessment means that some students may not want to return to campus for the summer term. For students living on campus, you will be able to continue living in your room and if you are a student living in catered Halls you will still have your meals provided for you.
For all students, the library is currently open and working to provide as much of the nearly 1,000 reading lists we have available in digital forms, or is finding alternatives. Unless we are directed by an expert body to close them, facilities such as cafes and the shop will remain open as far as possible.
While final year exams and assessments will be conducted online, students can be assured that assessment will be rigorous and valid as well as fair and reasonable. The College currently has academic standards for extenuating circumstances and extensions. These will be adapted so that they are appropriate for end of year online assessment.
Graduation
If you are a final year undergraduate or postgraduate student and you successfully complete your final year assessments to the required standard you will be awarded your degree in July, as would normally be the case.
We have taken the difficult decision to cancel the formal Summer Graduation Ceremonies that would normally be held on campus in July. We are investigating alternative ways for graduating students to celebrate their achievements. We will provide more information at a later date.
We are currently planning for the Winter Graduation Ceremonies, which would normally be held in December and which are primarily for postgraduate taught and postgraduate research students, to go ahead as planned, but we will keep this under review.
In order for us to contact you, and send your results documentation, please make sure you update your personal email and forwarding (home) addresses on Campus Connect.
Term two assignments and assessments.
If you have been working on an assignment this term you will be expected to complete it within the deadline set. However, we recognise that these are exceptional times, and the College will treat applications for extensions from individual students sympathetically. These extensions are to help you manage your work schedule around travelling home, self-isolation and other disruptions caused by the current circumstances. Students who need an extension for a specific assignment should submit an extensions request by logging into Campus Connect and selecting ‘Extensions’ under the ‘My studies’ tab
A limited number of assessments will be cancelled because they involve on-campus activities such as laboratory work, and some presentations. Your department or school will contact you directly to let you know this. These contribute small parts of the overall mark for a module, and your mark will be scaled-up from other assessments.
Please do not currently submit applications for extenuating circumstances as we are unable to judge the impact that the current situation has and will have on our students at this time. There will be the opportunity to do so at a future date, if appropriate.
Leaving campus
If you are leaving campus ahead of the end of the spring term (27 March) you must inform Student-Administrationroyalholloway.ac.uk of your plan to leave.
Support for you
We are living through events that are unprecedented in our lifetime and each day the situation changes. I appreciate this is worrying and confusing and that you have many questions that we do not have answers for. Where we do have answers we have included these in a section on the intranet about coronavirus (Covid-19).
If you are anxious or concerned and would like to talk to someone, please email supportingyouroyalholloway.ac.uk.
We will work hard to keep you up to date with developments that affect your studies and so please continue to check your email, the intranet and remain in contact with your lecturers, your department and school. Each week we will send a coronavirus (Covid-19) newsletter and provide updates on Twitter and Instagram @RHCampusLife.
Professor Paul Layzell
Principal