Extenuating Circumstances are defined as circumstances outside a students’ control that are serious, significant and/or unexpected affecting their ability to study, take part or submit assessments.
These exceptional circumstances may also have a negative impact on their performance in completing an assessment, coursework, exam or other academic activities required during a student’s chosen course of study or mean that they were unable to attend.
Extenuating Circumstances claims are often referred to as ECs.
Claims for ECs might be due to:
- serious personal physical or mental illness
- a change/exacerbation in an existing health condition at the time of an assessment
- death or serious illness of a family member or other person with whom a student had a close relationship
- significant personal or family crises leading to acute stress
- witnessing or experiencing a traumatic incident
- a crime which has had a substantial impact on the student
- an emergency or crisis that prevents the student from attending an exam or accessing an online assessment
- exceptional and/or unforeseen employment commitments (reviewed on a case-by-case basis).
The extenuating circumstance policy has changed for the 24/25 academic year.
For most coursework, you can submit work late (post the deadline in Moodle) up to 5 working days with no impact on your academic mark and if you are unable to submit within the 5 working days, you will be able to submit during the resit period for an uncapped mark. You will not need to make an extenuating circumstance claim for these, you are automatically provided this support for coursework.
For exams, you will automatically receive an uncapped resit if you fail or are unable to sit the first attempt. Again, you will not need to make a claim for this.
However, if you feel that given your circumstances, you will need support beyond either a 5 working day extension or an uncapped resit submission, please let us know by completing an extenuating circumstance claim found on the My Academic Development tab in myAccount and we can process this for further support. If this is the case, official evidence of your circumstances covering the assessment period will be required.
The full Late Submission and Extenuating Circumstances Policy can be found on the Policies and Procedures page on our website.
