Uni threat to terminate student's studies

[Allshallbewell2021]

My ds has just succeeded in his appeal against a termination of studies based on non attendance. He had no idea that lectures were mandatory. His attendance is lower than the bar they expect but the dept dealing with him have not been explicit about either of these figures.
His work is up to date.
He did not know lectures were mandatory -lecturers said they were 'important'.
He has had a large number of challenges which have effected his attendance.
I can't the brutality of the process. The stasi like language.
The lack of seeing young people (particularly the Covid uni cohort) as uniquely unlucky in uni terms.
The lack of support for someone struggling
The treatment of a student in a way which seems like they've committed real crimes not just misunderstood the rules.
When did the unis become such vicious places? I was so naive. I am horrified by their attitude. It seems like how you'd treat someone guilty of a serious crime.

I hope he can graduate within the conditions which have been set.

What conditions have been set? Do you mean turning up to lectures? Or are there extra conditions to his continued registration?

Do they all get full notes from lectures and everything they need to do the work in tutorials without attending?

Yes his work is completely up to date, that was part of his appeal - all the dates are ticked for all tasks and is a uni provided internal proof. His grades are good.
The good practice you all describe sounds great but there is little evidence that I can see and the student union advisors say the depts vary a good deal with their pastoral follow up. I think this has wrong on both sides.

Given the petulant post previous to this I think some posters might consider the the issue here is that the apple has not fallen very far from the tree...

Ok I'm going to apologise for that as it is harsh and I understand that you are very upset, emotional and worried about your son.

However, you are not helping him if you put the blame here on the Uni.

By the point he will have received notice of termination the language will absolutely NOT have been "fluffy" or kind and rightfully so.

It would have been direct and factual in order to make your son wake up to the severity of a situation he had previously chosen to ignore for some considerable time.

Likewise any letter overturning the termination, explaining the expectations of him continuing his course will equally not have been sugar coated.

The truth is that your son skipped past every offer of support, kindness and the opportunity to engage constructively to the point of crisis and blunt talking.

Moving forward I'd be asking him why he ignored the emails? What support does he need and is he going to make the effort to access it?

I understand why you might not want to give details, but it's hard to be specific without them other than saying that IME (especially post COVID) Uni's and the SU are very cognisant of supporting students but they have to be willing to engage.

⬆️ this

Has he actually been set work? I have 4 degrees from 4 very different universities.

In the first (1990s) attendance was expected but not monitored. No work set other than end of module essays. 100 students. Nobody would know if you weren't there.
The most recent was just before covid. We had to sign in. Less than 80% attendance was a fail. Still no formative assessment other than end of module assignment.

I'm really confused about how the university would know that he was up to date with his work since I've never known regular work set. It's not like school where you get homework.

I appreciate all your advice but I can't go further into identifying detail.
Thank you.

You've not said what subject he's studying. They vary hugely in their attendance requirements in my experience. Arts students rarely seem to have mandatory lectures. Sciences require much more in the way of attendance

I'm really confused about how the university would know that he was up to date with his work since I've never known regular work set. It's not like school where you get homework.

Depends on the course. My students have a number of formative and summative assessments throughout the year and we monitor engagement through these assessments and regular tasks.

It's considered poor practice to lump all the assessments at the end of a year/course as it can be harder to monitor engagement and is more stressful for the students.

I'm really confused about how the university would know that he was up to date with his work since I've never known regular work set. It's not like school where you get homework.

I expect it is because all his assignments have been handed in on time.

He's an adult. Others his age are in full-time jobs. They wouldn't be getting off on appeal if they consistently just failed to turn up, whatever the reason.

I haven't read the entire thread but wanted to add that I studied law between 2012-2017 (inc. LLB & MA) at a Russell Group uni and none of my lectures were mandatory nor was attendance taken. Seminars were mandatory. The attitude seemed to be that if you didn't keep up, you would fail and leave the course.

My view is that uni is what you make of it at your own expense. Taking a register and complaining about lack of attendance seems more akin to what students endure at secondary school.

Hopefully he is able to overcome and make the most of the second chance he's got!

That's true. I did law. You didn't have to attend lectures. Lots of my fellow mature students didn't as they could read the chapter in the textbook and the cases plus articles and glance at the lecture slides to see what topics focused on and that was enough. The lecture was just an introduction to that topic.

Lectures were optional when I was a student, I mostly ignored them and learned from books and individual tutorials.

Poor dude

Sorry but you are doing him a huge disservice. That's madness to think lectures are optional. Why would anyone bother? What do you mean his work is "up to date"? Please don't pander to this - he's going to have to survive in the real world!

I think it's bollocks too, they are adults FFS, where's the freedom? And not only that, paying through the nose for the experience. They should decide what lectures they need to attend to get out of it. Obviously if exams/assignments are missed or show they are struggling then concerns should be raised.

They should decide what lectures they need to attend to get out of it. Obviously if exams/assignments are missed or show they are struggling then concerns should be raised.

Yes, because obviously an undergraduate student understands much better than the professors who designed the programme what’s needed to meet the subject benchmark and pass the course.

By the time they have missed or failed the exams, that’s a whole year in time and fees wasted. And as we can see from this thread, the parents will be blaming the university, not the student, for that.

I am not blaming the uni. I just want to understand the muddled language of the letter he's been sent. There are no facts or data or actual descriptions of attendance levels. It's all a bit vague.
If you're going to talk your big trousers there should be facts surely? It is paradoxical to allow an appeal on grounds of personal struggle while dictating the terms of judging that struggle. I get it; but there is a lot of room for subjective interpretations and of course in the world of work - one expects such rigor. But at uni I think they need untangle their pastoral and administrative roles at least so it's comprehensible to the virtually terminated. Students make big and small mistakes and it seems probable that unis do too?

I really appreciate all these posts but actually people who work for universities are universally assuming this uni has been punctilious in their processes. All the non uni people are saying all sorts of variations on mandatory lectures - so it seems not so black and white. The union advisor says they're helping lots of people with termination letters this month. Maybe they're lying - but why would they?

But you have been blaming the Uni and even above you still are.

I think it's very likely you are missing big pieces of the story here in terms of communications, meetings and proceedings.

I'm not suggesting your son is lying, but he may well have not given you all the facts and presented those he has given in a favourable light to himself.

Either way you cut this, he's not been attending mandatory lectures (a requirement of his course he was responsible for understanding) and been censured for that.

He's had a narrow escape re: an appeal and needs to learn and move on, not fail to learn an important lesson here by deflecting blame from himself - and you need to help him with that by stopping your finger pointing at the Uni and focusing on why your son didn't access support he was entitled to and allowed the situation to become critical by ignoring repeated attempts by the Uni to discuss it with him.

OP, Universities have a myriad of Committees and Faculty meetings - there will have been a few of these before it got to the stage of terminating his studies. If you think he got a couple of emails and one person decided he couldn't continue you are wrong. This will have taken quite a while, whatever the reasons your son didn't engage with the University he'll have had many chances to do so.

It's not fair to blame the University, or describe their language as 'stasi'. To move forward, I would focus on getting your son to keep up with the terms of the reinstatement (has his degree been capped?) and focus less on blaming anyone - he's done what he's done, now he has to make the best of it.

The union advisor says they're helping lots of people with termination letters this month. Maybe they're lying - but why would they?

You posted this while I was typing - maybe, just like your son, the students didn't turn up for lectures or engage with the University. If you really think the University has got EVERY SINGLE CASE WRONG, you are more than deluded.

OP, assuming your DS is a reasonably intelligent cove (him being at university would suggest same) maybe this will be his wake up call.

There will always be lots of students who get terminated for attendance, the majority of those did/do know the requirements. But either they’re not bothered or don’t think it will actually happen or are having such bad mental health issues that they stick their head in the sand.

my course is particularly strict as it’s a professionally registered course and they can’t graduate unless they have done 100% of the theory hours. Attendance is 100% and can only be missed in exceptional circumstances and then they have to provide written evidence of having done 3 hours of work for having missed the register. It’s clearly written in their course handbook. I stand up and explain it clearly on their first day. I still get the occasional student who misses 50% of lectures due to tummy aches and ear aches and general tiredness. I get them in and explain they will be kicked off the course. They promise to attend and then a week later they’re emailing in sick again and then seem genuinely amazed when I kick them off. 🤷‍♀️

The university will be legally required to carry out some of those terminations for non-attendance that the students union has mentioned. For international students, attendance is a condition of their visa.