unhappy with dissertation result

[sunshineNdaisies]

Okay so I realise I probably am, but hear me out and I want some inside into how the grading might work as I was last in education about 15 years ago.

I've just submitted a postgraduate masters research dissertation and got a provisional grade of 65%. It goes to the external examiner and I'm not sure what the likelihood of it being increased is? Because tbh I was hoping for a higher grade, a distinction.

The reasoning for this is that my original supervisor kept telling me I would definitely get a distinction, and that if I wanted to progress onto a PHD, then I needed a distinction grade. Throughout my course, she kept telling me what a high standard my work was, encouraged me to present at conferences, submit articles etc. Her area of research is similar to mine.

She went on sick leave in April though, and I had another supervisor who I felt was much more strict and nitpicky but I took her advice on board, thinking it's good to get different opinions after all. Her area of research is not in my area but is almost identical to another student (who we will call E) and I understand that E got a lot of information and resources from the new supervisor to help with her own research.

New supervisor said that whilst the dissertation had to be between 15,000 to 17,000 words, it was okay to be a few hundred words over. I was 50 words over.

Anyway, long story short. I got 65% provision and E says she got "an A" which will be anything from 70%. I feel pretty disappointed as I think the fact she had the same topic area as our supervisor and had additional support from that supervisor played a part.

I feel angry that I was led to believe by the original supervisor that I would get a distinction and then I do not. The original supervisor did not give me any materials etc despite having a similar research area, unlike the new supervisor with E. I just felt that the original supervisor actually understood what I was doing better.

In addition, it was a 2 year course, but 3 of us submitted a year early. All of us have full time jobs and kids. I'm also disabled. I just feel that I put more work in and had to struggle more than the others.

Can anyone advise on whether the external examiner is likely to increase my grade? Do you think my new supervisor was wrong to say it was okay to go slightly over my word count and would that have played a part in my grade? I submitted my dissertation a month before the deadline but E told us she was still writing it on the last day of submission.

I've got this desire to prove myself I must admit, I've always felt I wasn't good enough and I had gotten my hopes up of a distinction as a means to prove to myself and those who bully me in work etc that I am good enough.

Can anyone make me feel any better?

IME (former academic) all dissertations are double-marked.

EE are unlikely to bump up individual marks, particularly when it takes the mark into the next band, ie from merit to distinction. It has happened (though not to me, thankfully) that an EE will want the entire batch of marking moved up or down a band.

Echoing everyone else:
EEs do not mark work, generally. They ensure that the marking criteria are being applied correctly and that second marking / moderation has taken place correctly.

Your family situation and your disability wouldn’t be considered as extenuating factors nor factors for mitigation, for the reasons others have stated.

Your supervisor shouldn’t have said “you’re in line for a distinction” as it can be misconstrued as being misleading, ie “you’ll get a distinction”. Sadly, this advice would not form the basis of a good grounds for appeal.
Neither is appealing because you disagree with the academic judgement of the markers.

You should get feedback with your work and I would recommend making an appointment with your programme leader/manager/whoever to discuss said feedback.

65 is a great mark-well done!

I took it as E having the same supervisor for the whole dissertation process, whereas OP had the original sup from Sept-April then had to finish off with sup 2 as E was finishing. Thus E had consistency and had had more support all along which is what she finds unfair.
Could be wrong

I had a similar issue with my undergrad.
Tutor kept saying it was good, tips to improve were few. Then I got a shit mark and it pulled down the whole grade. I was gutted.

Well to be honest E did the right thing in not handing it in early and working on it, correcting mistakes etc until the deadline. You handed yours in early, which while admirable was also foolish as it had errors. You may have seen those in any extra proof reading.

You still got a good mark and it's nothing to hate or be annoyed at E or your supervisors for. They can say you should get a distinction but can't guarantee it. My teacher said I could easily get a b in English in high school and all of my grades leading up to the exam said the same thing. But on the exam day, I had a bad cold and couldn't remember much so got a c. No ones fault, just one of those things.

I'm thinking more about this, the 65 is just for the dissertation top up isn’t it, not the whole course, so the diploma marks would have meant a distinction wasn’t possible anyway? To pull up any 50 and 60 marks youd have needed 80+ from the dissertation. And that wasn’t consistent with your previous marks. So why she told you it was possible seems odd?

Your original supervisor left in April, so presumably only discussed your planned work, possibly saw early notes and even some initial drafts but did not see your final drafts or completed work, so while they might have made encouraging (and or possibly ill judged comments) the final work was assessed by examiners who saw the completed dissertation and found it wanting. Perhaps your first assessor was over generous in their comments, or as others have suggested, your final execution lost marks by not sticking to the published guidelines or by you not paying enough attention to the fine detail of rigorous editing.

I sympathise with how disappointed you feel. I pulled out of an MA back in January due to a variety of issues, including with the supervisor. I already have an MA which I was awarded back in 2000 and all I can say is that academia seems to have changed - I found it was all extremely 'inside the box' and you had to write and indeed, think, in a certain way - much more so than I experienced before.

However, I'm afraid that your previous supervisor may not have been following good practice as she shouldn't have discussed marks with you or implied you'd get a distinction - she simply couldn't know that till it was finished, marked and moderated. I think that's where the issue lies. Who knows, it may have affected more students than just you - she did leave.

However, you did well in what sound like challenging circumstances so well done! You have passed and passed well!

thank you.

the three who submitted were only doing the dissertation module as we had all achieved the PgD several years before. We had two years to do this module but we managed to submit early. I submitted several drafts and edited and proof read extensively. I submitted because I had done all corrections etc the new supervisor had recommended and could find no other errors or consider anything new to add. I had my first full draft with my original supervisor in April and she said it looked very good, so I spent the next few months making edits etc for submission in late June (deadline end of July)

I know it's a good grade and I'm pleased with it, I'm just worried about what I can do with a merit instead of a distinction. My best friend was a straight A student throughout school and university so I do feel inadequate at times.

Meh, I got a distinction at MSc and I'm a year (ish) away from PhD submission. Not all PhDs are preceded by Distinctions.

This isn't aimed at you op, but often advice on these types of threads is to appeal the mark. That is bad advice. Academic judgement is final unless there are specific (very specific and evidenced) grounds for it to be re-marked. Not getting a mark as high as one would like or thinks it deserves does not fall under this banner.

Haha! I didn't get a distinction at all, I got a Merit. Sorry, badly multi tasking.

‘Managed to submit early’ still sounds bizarre, I’m afraid. I honestly don’t know anyone who submits early - there is no benefit to doing so and an awful lot of potential problems. Is it possible that your original supervisor based her comments on the usual trajectory of students at that point in the final year (ie one hell of a lot of rewriting, reorganizing, and a good few months of ft sweat to make it as perfect as possible) and you read that very early comment to mean it only needed minor tidying up?
Either way, it’s a great result.
But I’m still boggled that anyone hands in early. In my experience, the sweating and revision and worrying carries on until the last second so I can’t decide whether to admire your... confidence? Laissez-faire? or fret about the decision on your behalf!

You also need to stop focussing on what E did or did not do because you really don't know how hard they worked and their circumstances. There are no bonus points for submitting early and she submitted in time. My DS submitted literally last minute.

65 is a great mark. If your previous supervisor knew she was leaving maybe she took the easy route lf saying all was ok rather than having to put extra effort in. Alternatively she looked at it as a work in progress so wasn't realistically i a position to predict a final grade.

That’s a very good score firstly, well done.

Secondly, I’m afraid to say external examiners very, very rarely disagree with the mark given. I teach FE in a college so slightly different but obviously have been through uni myself too. I have had external moderators reduce a students mark once but never increase it. I was pretty gutted for said student and encouraged them to appeal the decision.

It can happen but it is rare so I wouldn’t expect it if I were you.

No, the external examiner won't increase the mark.

Yes, Supervisors make a big difference and seems you were unlucky. If you wanted a first though, would have been wise to discuss this with new supervisor (a lot) and get loads of feedback before submission, and listen to new supervisors advice and do whatever they recommended. You might well have done that.

65 is a v good mark for a dissertation. If you want to do a PhD it won't preclude you.

Good luck for your future career

No advice, just some empathy. My dissertation supervisor and I had similar research interests. She was always lovely. Then she decided (six weeks before my hand in) that she could no longer be a supervisor to anyone and I got assigned a new one. He tore my work to bits, made me start again. When it came to my final marking he scored higher than my original supervisor did (she was still agreeable to being the second marker). It's so frustrating how subjective it can be. Luckily for me it didn't pull me down into the next bracket, but I often wonder if the original supervisor wanted to grade me lower but didn't out of guilt!

I'm an academic. I would NEVER tell a student they would definitely get a particular grade in advance of them submitting - I'm surprised your original supervisor did this. I guide students as to whether the work is of passable standard and what different grading criteria is looking for, but its a very bad idea, especially these days, to promise things that aren't necessarily going to transpire once the final work is submitted as inevitably students will be disappointed and of course complain.

First of all, 65% at Masters level is an excellent result. I don't know why you're angry. You are projecting your disappointment onto people who have actually taught you well. Your anger is misdirected.

Your OP outlines no grounds for any errors in academic process. That is the only ground on which you can appeal - that there's been some sort of mishandling in terms of the process.

However, you can't challenge academic judgement. And generally that judgement is NOT subjective. Two examiners may differ (but rarely by much) because people are different - it doesn't mean either is "subjective". Your dissertation will have been marked according to the Intended Learning Outcomes of your programme/course, and the specific criteria for that module. Generally by two examiners, neither of whom is your supervisor. If there's a big difference between the 2 markers, then it'll go to a 3rd marker usually.

The External Examiner will also look to check it's been marked in accordance with the learning outcomes and criteria for the module.

"Subjective" unfair or faulty marking rarely gets through all of that.

I feel angry that I was led to believe by the original supervisor that I would get a distinction and then I do not. The original supervisor did not give me any materials etc despite having a similar research area, unlike the new supervisor with E. I just felt that the original supervisor actually understood what I was doing better.

It sounds as though you got a lot of supervision & support. What other students received, in terms of supervision and marks is nothing to do with you and you cannot raise this as part of any question you might try to raise about your mark.

Every dissertation project is different, and the interaction between supervisor and student will be different, too.. These are individual research projects, and you are all individuals - a supervisor may treat two students she's supervising differently because they are different people doing different projects.

And your first supervisor became ill; you were given a substitute, who sounds as though they were committed and gave you useful feedback - they would have taken on their colleague's workload as extra on top of their normal workload at a very busy time - we can't just bring in "agency staff."

Or did you expect that someone on sick leave keeps on working? That is very unreasonable. You were given another supervisor - what else do you think should have happened?

In addition, it was a 2 year course, but 3 of us submitted a year early. All of us have full time jobs and kids. I'm also disabled. I just feel that I put more work in and had to struggle more than the others.

The work is the work is the work. You can be given "reasonable adjustments" to help you deal with extra difficulties you have - although only for your disability - a full-time job and kids is life. But reasonable accommodation or adjustment doesn't mean extra marks - it generally means a longer period of time to complete the assessment task, or assistance via extra support for dyslexia etc.

So I wonder why you submitted earlier than you needed to? Maybe your work at this point isn't of distinction level - 5% below is not borderline - it's pretty clearly in the Merit category. Maybe if you'd used the third year, which it sounds as though you could have - your dissertation research & thinking would have "cooked" more ?

So these are some things to think about before you blame the people who've taught you.

Yes, I’d also agree that submitting earlier could have been detrimental to the mark, in that it was maybe rushed. I used the full time, it meant I got some breathing space and didn’t feel consumed by it. I interviewed a lot of people and had to transcribe each one. If I’d have tried to rush that, it wouldn’t have got me the marks it did.

No, the external examiner won’t increase your mark.

Were you hoping to pull up your overall mark at PGDip with a distinction in the dissertation? I understand you’re disappointed but this would have taken something really outstanding; distinctions are actually pretty sparingly awarded in most disciplines and it’s not really something that anyone should ‘expect’ unless they have consistent 70+ marks throughout the course.

Distinctions in dissertations too are much harder to obtain than distinctions in exams as they require much more of a sustained and complex intellectual process. As harsh as it sounds, if you’re not hitting distinctions in exams, you probably won’t at dissertation either.

It seems from your post that you worked really hard, and it may be personal circumstances that spurred you on to submit early, but I’d encourage you to really think hard about doing a PhD and, particularly, why you want to do one. They take a long time and you have to be pretty resilient to come out of the other side - there is a lot of rejection as part of the process. You mention your high-achieving friend a lot and I would be concerned that your desire to do a PhD is fuelled by a need to prove yourself.

The EE will be exceptionally unlikely to increase the grade, that’s not the point of them.

@Uncreative you are confusing the external examiner with the second marker.

Finally, if your handbook says the word length should be 15-17k and you went over that, even by one word, then yes there will probably be a sliding penalty applied. I agree with a PP who is astonished you didn’t check your handbook to see what was required. There is no excuse not to at master’s level.