Ninth Level Ireland

“NUI Galway has come under criticism by students and NUIGSU for not waiving their €295 resit fees despite their purpose being questioned in light of ongoing COVID-19 restrictions. This comes in the wake of myriad other Irish third-level institutions waiving this fee, including University College Cork, NUI Maynooth, Trinity College Dublin, Dublin City University, Athlone IT …” (more)

[Jack McGee, College Tribune, 17 February]

“Students in third and fourth year will be able to resit semester-two assessments that count towards their degree, even if they pass them the first time, senior lecturer Kevin Mitchell said today. Mitchell told students in an email yesterday that no mitigating measures would be introduced for the semester-two assessment period, but this morning clarified that this was incorrect …” (more)

[Emer Moreau, University Times, 16 February]

“Minister for Higher Education Simon Harris has said DkIT students having their exam results withheld due to industrial action at the college is ‘entirely unacceptable’. The Teachers Union of Ireland (TUI) Branch at Dundalk Institute of Technology – which represent lecturers and researchers …” (more)

[Michelle O’Keeffe, Dundalk Democrat, 12 February]

“NUI Galway has once again come under fire for its €295 exam repeat fee. Students who need to repeat an exam have to pay a flat fee of €295, and repeating one exam costs the same as repeating six. NUI Galway Students’ Union has criticised the fee, saying that the majority of the repeat exams will take place off-campus and students will be using their own laptops …” (more)

[Aine Kenny, Irish Examiner, 10 February]

“During the first week of the current Students’ Union term in July, the issue of repeat fees emerged much like every issue, it started by raising it with university management. Before our term, it had been sought several times with the indication that the fees wouldn’t be charged. We believed that NUI Galway would be like nearly every other institution in the country and waive repeat fees. This wasn’t the case and they planned on charging them …” (more)

[Pádraic Toomey, SIN, 9 February]

“The university has released a statement following calls from Students’ Union leaders to remove such repeat fees and also to give students the option to repeat exams if they feel they could have achieved better grades in normal circumstances. In a statement released by the University, it says students who are in the most need of financial support can apply for a fee waiver …” (more)

[Galway Bay FM, 26 January]

“Union leaders are appealing to NUI Galway to show compassion to students who are sitting exams. Students’ Union leaders from GMIT, UCC, Trinity College Dublin and the Union of Students in Ireland have written to the NUIG President and Vice President to voice concern’s over the university’s opposition to the introduction of policies aimed at supporting students …” (more)

[Galway Bay FM, 25 January]

“Inflated grades observed in last year’s exams were ‘likely’ due to the shift to online assessments, Senior Lecturer Kevin Mitchell has said. Percentage marks, he said in an email to this newspaper, were ‘slightly inflated last year, based on a comparison of average yearly grades from 2019/20 to the previous year’ …” (more)

[Cormac Watson, University Times, 22 January]

“UCDSU President Conor Anderson took to the ‘No Detriment’ Facebook group on Monday night in light of the recent news that both UCC and Trinity have brought in new accommodations to assist students during the ongoing pandemic …” (more)

[Rosie Kuntz, College Tribune, 19 January]

“Northern Ireland’s two main universities have been urged to follow the lead of their counterparts in Great Britain and introduce a ‘no detriment’ policy to protect student grades against the effects of the Covid-19 pandemic. Alliance MLA Stewart Dickson said he has written to both academic institutions, asking them to follow the policy …” (more)

[Mark Bain, Belfast Telegraph, 13 January]

“In the midst of escalating case numbers and yet another lockdown, it would have been easy to miss the nugget of good news for students last week. After third-level students were yet again ignored in the announcement of lockdown restrictions, Trinity students had reasons for small celebration. College announced in an email that some of the mitigation measures, introduced last summer for exams, would remain in place for the upcoming examination season in recognition of the current ‘extremely difficult and stressful situation’ in which students have to try and study …” (more)

[University Times, 10 January]

“Trinity’s branch of the Irish Federation of University Teachers (IFUT) has said that mitigation measures for assessment should only be introduced in ‘exceptional’ circumstances and should not continue past the coronavirus crisis …” (more)

[Sárán Fogarty, University Times, 9 January]

“It is no secret that online learning has proven to have both advantages and disadvantages. Having the classroom ripped away from students has left many hunched over their laptops at home for what seems to be hours on end …” (more)

[Shannon McGreevy, Trinity News, 9 January]

“It’s the day before the start of the January examination period at Maynooth University so I thought I’d do a quick post on the topic of examinations or, as they are right now, online timed assessments. First, for readers elsewhere, full-time undergraduate students at Maynooth what is called 60 ‘credits’ in a year, usually split into two semesters of thirty credits each …” (more)

[In the Dark, 7 January]

“University College Cork (UCC) has reintroduced the No Academic Disadvantage measures for their upcoming examinations this January. All students received an email from the Interim Registrar Stephen Byrne on Wednesday stating that ‘in recognition of these exceptional circumstances’ the University has ‘reinstated the additional No Academic Disadvantage” policy and these measures “will apply for the full academic year 2020/2021’ …” (more)

[Fiona Keeley, University Express, 6 January]

“For people who are in their fourth year of college or have been in Trinity for four years, they will have now studied under a total of three different exam structures; the most recent being exams after Christmas. This new exam structure was implemented after the coronavirus pandemic shut college down a number of weeks early last year and forced the majority of teaching and mentoring online …” (more)

[Phoebe Otway-Norwood, Trinity News, 1 January]

“The health risks posed by COVID-19 mean most Canadian university classes are online this year. As a result, some students will write exams online via remote proctoring platforms that surveil their activities. These tools go by names like ProctorU, Examity, Respondus and Proctorio, among others. Designed by for-profit tech startups, they monitor students’ laptops, tablets or phones during the course of an exam …” (more)

[Bonnie Stewart, The Conversation, 3 December]

“A lack of student support and anger around the ‘No Detriment’ policy is the the reason the University College Dublin Students’ Union (UCD SU) will no longer push for the Covid-19 Assessment Guidelines to be extended into this exam season, according to SU President Conor Anderson …” (more)

[Stephen Kisbey-Green, College Tribune, 1 December]

“Trinity’s Senior Lecturer Kevin Mitchell is proposing that College does not bring in any emergency measures for the upcoming exam period similar to those introduced for last year’s summer exams. Mitchell said that College ‘will certainly employ a sympathetic approach and increased level of flexibility’ for individual cases due to the ongoing pandemic …” (more)

[University Times, 25 November]

“The sudden onset of Covid-19 in early March required a rapid re-think of how normal assessment processes would work from home. Temporary measures were put in place to address the added pressure of the pandemic to the summer exam season, but UCC has made the decision to rescind such measures for this academic year …” (more)

[Maeve McTaggart, University Express, 24 November]