English degree with exams (not 100% coursework)

[UniTendril]

My dd is looking at English degrees, she’s looking for courses which aren’t completely coursework and are more traditional (she likes close analysis and classics). She’s a hard worker and would be happy with a course that was pretty intense.

It’s proving surprisingly hard to get this information. She’s booked a few open days and will ask questions at those.

I know this board has a lot of experts, any suggestions of where might be worth a look?

She’s being encouraged by her school to apply for Oxbridge, so she’s a strong student.

I’ve been a couple of years out of higher education but I can’t imagine it’s changed - All Courses should publish a programme specification which should give this information.

I think many institutions are in fact shifting away from coursework and back to arts exams with the advent of AI cheating. My own had gone to almost full coursework during Covid, but is reintroducing exams over the past couple of academic years.

@iggleoggle Shes been searching and I think she’s mostly finding the specifications, (though there are some broken links / under review), but is struggling to find how they’re assessed. And more generally to get a sense of whether it’s one essay a week or one essay a term levels of work, or something in between.

Its not actually that difficult find out how BA English lit is assessed at various universities. Normally its right there on the Dept web page like this one at University of York:

www.york.ac.uk/study/undergraduate/courses/ba-english/

I think at Oxford its going to be something like 10 essays over 8 wks.
At RG universities its obviously a longer term and far fewer essays.

Have her drop an email to the School/Department Manager or Director of Studies, who may be able to send her a copy of the online ‘course booklet’ for every year of the degree (ours is on our online platform for enrolled students, which is why she won’t find it on the public website) , which will include detail in how a module is assessed.

In department, big lecture courses assessed by coursework will generally have a midterm and an end of term essay. Smaller seminars will be a bit more varied, and may involve keeping journals, presentations etc.

@Flyswats Thanks! That’s super useful, both the link (she’s going to an open day at York) and the relative amount of work. Is there any online way to find out how the workload varies between Russell Group unis, or is that an open day question? She’s been trawling the student discussion boards (student room?) that discuss courses, so she’s got some info but it’s patchy. You can probably tell I’ve left her to it up to now, so I’m a bit clueless but trying to catch up!

@SeaFloor Thank you! I’ll pass that on, as that’s exactly the sort of information she’s been struggling to find.

Both Oxford and Cambridge fit her criteria, definitely.

This might prove tricky for English as most unis have moved towards more coursework type approaches. Also , bear in mind exams are generally not sit in an exam hall for a few hours type exams.

I agree, FWIW , that it's oddly difficult to find this out. York has always been more transparent. Other websites tend towards vagueness ,partly because different modules may be assessed differently.

Discover uni will provide links to the assessment pages - Bristol and Birmingham seemed quite detailed with modules listed.

But unis can be nervous about putting very detailed info online in case it changes, or a module is withdrawn. The CMA has fined a uni before who didn’t have accurate information so we’re a bit twitchy about committing too much.

DD studying English at Cambridge, an essay or outline each week per topic in the most part. So for example one essay on Medieval literature and an arguments outline for literary criticism. Occasionally she has had two full essays a week.l but the supervisors try to avoid that, some are more flexible than others. .

During exam term it is different so this term she had four weeks of teaching and two weeks of exams but not too intense (3 exams well spaced out, 3 hours each). Out of her college cohort of 7 she is the only one doing exams in the faculty exam hall as all the others have mitigations allowing different exam conditions.

There are also options to swap one exam for a more detailed assessed paper, she did one this year. 30% of grade is assessed on Y2 exams/paper and the rest is all on Y3 making it quite a lot riding on the final year but I see now how the tutorial system gets them to the best place by this time and so they will have grown in a academic capability by then so makes sense.

If it helps Warwick is predominately course work and one exam at the end of year one. They read a lot and have to translate work from Middle English etc so course work makes complete sense for an English degree.

I think its likely an open day question so long as it isn't already outlined on the dept site / modules of the place you're attending an open day.

Some depts will say 100% essays for assessment, others might say 50/50 exams & essays.

Early days looking into this kind of thing we set up an excel spreadsheet to keep track of the info and make comparisons. It depends on how anal you are and what your memory is like

I agree it’s a question for an open day.

But FWIW DD did Eng lit BA (at Leicester) and also had offers for Brum and Warwick. Both B and W certainly offered some coursework options as she asked at open days (she is not a fan of exams).

In the end virtually all her work was coursework (her only exams in year 1 were abandoned bc Covid). She chose modules with this in mind though – exam-assessed modules were also available. Hence it might be difficult for unis to say – modules vary and this or that module may not run in a specific year.

DD tho for example of workload in her last year had two shorter modules in each term and then one longer module in term 1 and a diss in term 2. So (from memory) 4 x 3,000 word essays, 1 x 5,000 word essay and a 7,000 word diss (which is pretty short and was a struggle haha).

HTH and best of luck to her – it's a great subject.

All universities should give an indication of how the course will be assessed - it's considered part of the contractual information for a degree. However, for exactly this reason, it is likely to be pretty vague. They won't tell you that four specific modules will have exams and all others will be coursework as that really constrains their ability to change it and there are many good reasons why they might want to change assessment modes at some point before your DD would finish her degree. In many cases it will also depend on your DD's module choice. If the degree is 100% coursework as a policy decision by the department that information should be available, though.

She should consider applying for UCL.

I don't know for sure but my hunch would be that Durham is somewhat more traditional in its offering so might be worth a look.

York, for example, always prided itself on being really modern ( not in texts, necessarily, but in outlook). It pioneered continuous assessment years ago , so she won't get that very traditional assessment style there.

I would say they all do close textual analysis though?

Thanks everyone!

@RoseAndGeranium She loves the look of the UCL course, but doesn’t want to be in London as that’s where she’s grown up. She’s looking for similar courses elsewhere.

@PettsWoodParadise That’s the sort of workload she’s expecting and would like. She’s just trying to work out if there’s anywhere outside Oxbridge that is like that, for English.

@Flyswats She has a table with the options and what she’s found out!

@Lavendersong That’s really useful to know, she’s been trying to find out exactly that.

@Piggywaspushed She’s going to open days at both York and Durham, so that’s useful to know as she can ask the right questions.

I’ve had a chat to DD, and what she’s aiming for is having essays marked by tutors, rather than the more creative, group work and peer-assessed type of things.

She’s finding it hard to find out much about the Bristol course (other than an old Reddit thread), if anyone knows about that?

She’s also wondering about Scottish universities, if anyone knows anything about those?

St Andrew's, in particular, is highly regarded for English. I imagine it's fairly traditional.

I wonder how much Scottish literature is in Scottish degrees. Not much , I expect , at St Andrews or Edinburgh.

You'll get essays marked by tutors on all courses. The group work stuff is usually module dependent and generally can be avoided.

Off the top of my head, I'd say Oxford or Cambridge. She'll write - a LOT, with her weekly essays, but it's the exams which will mostly determine her degree classification. I think Lancaster however, has compulsory exams for every subject - or it did when I taught there about 20 years ago.

Most other universities have modernised, and offer a wide range of assessment types. We find it's more helpful for different students, who all articulate their learning differently.

So the other way to approach this might be for your DD to think differently about other types of assessment, as she'll develop - and be able to demonstrate - a much broader range of ability and skill, as well as appreciating that we develop knowledge in a variety of ways.

The way a child studies a subject at school is very different from the professional, scholarly constitution of a discipline. In most Humanities subjects, such as English Lit, we want students to develop considered and in-depth writing. THe essay, developed over weeks & days of reading & writing, is far better than the 3 hour exam for developing and testing writing & thinking through writing.

But Oxford doesn't generally do continuous assessment. The weekly essays are about knowledge development and an indication of how exams will go. (Or so it was in my day ..)

@Piggywaspushed Edinburgh do a Scottish literature degree. However you used to be able switch between it and English lit until 3rd year (or do a joint).

@UniTendril Edinburgh English Lit continuous assessment rather than exams so you can score off your DDs list (meets the other aspects though)

For Bristol you need to click into the individual units and it tells you the assessment information for each one. eg ENGL10042 (which is mandatory): 1,250 word critical commentary (50%), 2 hour exam (40%), Contribution mark (10%).

www.bris.ac.uk/unit-programme-catalogue/RouteStructureCohort.jsa?ayrCode=25/26&byCohort=Y&programmeCode=1ENGL001U&_gl=1ascdnj_gaMTEyMjg1Njk4OS4xNzQ4NzExMjQ1_ga_6R8SPL3HLT*czE3NDg3MTEyNDAkbzEkZzAkdDE3NDg3MTEyNDAkajYwJGwwJGgw