Normally, you get four weeks to mark anything. But at the end of the academic year, things are different! The graduation ceremony is in July, so the powers that be need to know well in advance who will actually get to graduate. And this year that meant that our exam period ran until May 26, and everything had to be marked by June 2. And before the exam period, there is a lot of coursework to do. Some of that coursework has extensions; these can also run until May 26. And then there is the master students, who don't stop until September.
Altogether that meant that I had to mark my dissertations (6 of my own, 8 of other staff), three module exams, the essays of my tutees, one MSc final project, and two MSc literal reviews with project plans. And some of that had to be done within one four-day week. It is a fair amount! And it becomes a lot worse as all of that marking inevitably also comes with issues of academic integrity. I only had to mark a modest number of MSc work, but there was a lot of additional work that involved lack of paraphrasing. Because scientifically, I only have something to do with a few of the students. But when it comes to academic integrity, suddenly every single one of them is my business!
I went into that last, four-day week with only 7 out of 10 essays to mark, and the literature reviews. Not bad going! And 13 cases of academic integrity still to deal with. But the good thing is that when all the grades have to be in, this all stops! With the students not handing anything in for months, there is no marking and no academic integrity work. I'm glad! Time to get on with my Athena Swan work…
No comments:
Post a Comment