Uni of Edinburgh not marking dissertations/final pieces of work - anyone else's DC affected?

[Iliketulips]

DD heard this afternoon that her dissertation and final pieces of work are not to be marked by Uni of Edinburgh. She is absolutely devastated right now as she wanted her true degree result and feedback on hours of work. She feels her most recent work is the best, so will never know if she could have got her grade up. Moving forward she was seriously considering studying a masters abroad abroad and also working abroad, but now uncertain if that's possible as she thinks they'll wanted an athenticated degree.

It seems to me extremely unlikely that the work won’t be marked. Eventually. No one can afford to strike indefinitely. When that happens, transcripts will be adjusted accordingly. It’s also worth bearing in mind that many universities are currently frantically adapting their regulations and systems to mitigate the effects of the boycott. Therefore, clear statements have yet to be made by many universities. Add to that, departments within a single university will be impacted very differently by the boycott (the sciences are less affected than social sciences or humanities). So I would be surprised if a university has made a blanket statement that finalist dissertations won’t be marked. It is understandable that students are stressed but, at this point, the (understandable) anxiety is fuelling a lot of speculation and positing of scenarios that universities are working hard to avoid.

I think this is absolutely disgraceful. This cohort of students have suffered enough.

My advice to any worried parent here is to read GCAcademic's post above.

I also agree with @GCAcademic

OP, the work simply must be marked, eventually, and counted towards the degree classification. Any other line of action would be a contractual violation of Edinburgh’s relationship with its students and would be an open invitation to swingeing punitive damages.

The situation is awful and students counting on bringing their marks up with their final assessments may find themselves in a limbo

Posted prematurely…

of others making. But I am another RG academic who believes that what you’ve written has been, understandably, exaggerated by distraught students.

The email to my second year student was rather ambiguous but seeemd to imply that if a years' old dispute wasn't resolved by June 8th, any marking allocated to striking staff would never be done. I really hope that I am misunderstanding it, as this seems so utterly unacceptable.

Two of my friends' children were very excited to recently secure masters places, also at UCL but are now having second thoughts about paying £20k to have the two terms of teaching half missing and then the risk of no grading.

Both my children are affected but in different universities.

I’m struggling to have sympathy with those doing this, especially when in our house DHs pay rise was 0% and mine 3.5%. My employer pays the minimum pension contribution of 3% which is standard for my profession.

My understanding from UCU website is employer contribution is 21.6%

I’d be interested for someone from a university to let us know exactly what they are demanding and why. My dad was a teacher but was in a non striking union as he felt very strongly that children’s lives should not be impacted by grievances he may have with his employer.

As others have said, this generation have really been through the mill and it’s such a shame.

I'm a junior academic at a RG university, so this very much is my first experience of this but i can tell you what i know. We get emailed regularly asking if we can register as striking or not, despite not being required to actually say either way, so mitigation can be put in place. Im pretty sure departments can only guess who will refuse to mark so the Edinburgh message seems dramatic.

For what it's worth, I only have MSc students and I will be marking because they have had a crap university experience due to covid in undergrad and I don't think it's fair on them to add this extra stress. As one of the potential stike beneficiarys, being on an insecure contract, I would like better conditions for staff but the marking boycott doesn't sit well, I wish there was a better way.

Speaking to a friend yesterday, they have been told marking will be distributed to those not on strike and anyone not taking up the marking will be considered to be striking. That sounds off to me, but they apparently had a legal expert in the room as the message was delivered. I would also be sceptical about those marks, but hopefully people would mark up!

Please forgive typos, it's early and I need coffeffee

I think whoever came up with this idea as a strike measurement should not be involved in education at any level. To lay this level of uncertainty and stress on students and risk their futures at this stage is a really dreadful thing to do.

Academics are in the same boat as all the other public sector workers that are striking. After a decade of below inflation pay rises there has been serious pay erosion. Our pensions are good but they were recently downgraded quite severely. We also have issues with casualisation with widespread use of fixed term contracts, plus many in the sector are overworked.

We opposed student loan reform. And we are quite tired of watching cash go to VC mega salaries and new sports centres. The sector is now very unequal with some unis having huge reserves (who could afford to give a pay rise today) and others much closer to the edge. This has been exacerbated by government removal of place caps and a market based approach.

Many of us don't have a great deal of faith in the union after failed action has got us to this point but are also not able to get a mortgage these days so it's a really difficult situation.

VCs have it in their power to resolve this - quite easily actually. Complaints should be levelled at them.

Another one with a DD affected by this at Edinburgh in MFL. As one of the senior management at another RG tasked with ensuring our arrangements I can assure colleagues from other institutions that Edinburgh’s response is risible and raises serious questions over their understanding of quality assurance.

For me, the issue is that the Schools and Departments are so large and so devolved there is no consistency even within departments on QA and very poor understanding of it. It makes me question the credibility of external examiners and highlights problems with that process-which if it were Rngland would play into unfortunate hands.

I thought universities were privately run but with contracts with the government for providing degrees. I didn’t think they were public sector.
My old uni is always asking me to consider donating, so some will have greater reserves than other especially if there have been large donations.
Having such large employer pension contributions is probably not sustainable in the long term if reserves are low I guess.

I'm an academic and our university is playing complete hard ball on this and has said anyone who participates in the MAB will have 100% of their pay docked from 27 April onwards. They state they do not accept "partial performance" so even if other work is done, all pay will be docked.

I can't see many not marking as no one can afford not to - but not all universities are taking such a draconian line on docking 100% pay.

Public sector jobs pay just isn't keeping up with private sector. Despite being the jobs that provide the key essential infrastructure for the country. I've got four degrees and two professional qualifications for different industries. I could easily be earning double what I do had I remained in a private law firm. There needs to be some levelling on this but successive government has made a series of really poor decisions around this - both NHS and Education. And that is why we are here now.

The student loans is an expensive fiasco and saddled our young people with unmanageable debt.

The deregulation of universities so now it's a free for all with no caps on numbers has destabilised the system and unbalanced the entry processes.

The complete emphasis on academic degrees rather than technical training means students who would be more suited to quality and practical training to learn a trade end up doing a law degree. And really can't. But meanwhile you can never find a decent plumber!

Personally I will be marking because why I do the job is the satisfaction of helping young people achieve their goals and the privilege of being part of their lives at such a crucial time. And they've had such a rough time this cohort.

But the system is currently really broken and government needs to step up and govern and not be so hide bound by party politics and ideology and playing PM Musical Chairs.

I’m trying to understand this- universities are private institutions though? They aren’t public sector.

@Whoiscomingtosaveyou university lecturers are public sector employees according to the ONS definition.

im shocked to hear his. As a parent of a 21yr old who spent hours and hours on their dissertation this year I would be extremely angry and disappointed if it wasn’t marked.

This needs to be sorted out, our youngsters have worked extremely hard during a pandemic. My son is just finishing 4 th year and this is his first normal year at uni where he has met people in his course, so it’s been difficult enough without this added stress!

Sounds absolutely disgraceful! Is there a way of knowing which academics refuse to mark assignments so 1st/2nd/ future students can avoid their courses?
similarily choose lectures / courses/ universities where academics are not so militant?
It would certainly be a factor for me when helping my kids decide.

Just spoke to both our children and both had emails from uni to let them know about this situation but to continue with exams and final Pieces of work as usual.

from the email it sounds like exams/ assessments will be graded but not as quick as normally done,

Genuine question - are the people on this thread who are angry with the university lecturers also angry about the striking doctors, nurses and teachers? Or do they see this as different somehow?

I'm not striking btw - just curious.

They’re too busy preventing women from gathering to watch a film about women!

I think whoever came up with this idea as a strike measurement should not be involved in education at any level. To lay this level of uncertainty and stress on students and risk their futures at this stage is a really dreadful thing to do.
This. How to undermine your own profession. After their experience, it will be amazing if any of this year's graduates decide to pursue a career in higher education.

https://www.palatinate.org.uk/breaking-durham-university-to-withhold-50-of-pay-from-staff-taking-part-in-marking-boycott/

Yes there is a barking strike at lots of unis, the students have known about it for months.

Nice typo!

Just to point out the marking boycott isn't anything to do with pensions - the pensions offer has been accepted by the union. This one is the 'four fights' campaign: pay, precarity of employment (many who teach your offspring are on hourly paid or short term contracts), workloads and something else (equality across sector?).