1. “Fit to Sit” : can you please everyone?
Sandi Marshall : Policy Advisor Student Cases

2. Questions that are being asked
Yesterday on a JISC mail site the following questions were posed
• Have you considered introducing a Fit to Sit Policy?
• What was the reaction?
• If you have, did it reduce the number of appeals?

3. Why?
There are snags with extenuating circumstances procedures :
• risk of inconsistency in interpretation across the University
• students attempt to raise marks or classification
• increasing number of appeals based on late mitigation

4. The Exeter experience
• 500% increase in Stage 2 appeals over three years
• 250 appeals in 2011/12 – half of them late mitigation

5. Who has introduced Fit to Sit?
Of 24 Russell group Universities, the following have Fit to Sit
• Birmingham University
• Kings College London
• LSE
• Queen Mary’s

6. Positive Response
Those Universities who have introduced it report
• a clearer message
• more consistency
• fewer appeals eg Sunderland : MPharm drop in appeals from 16
in 2004/5 to 0 in 2006/7

7. Basic Principles
• by submitting an assessment or sitting an exam you confirm you
are fit to do so
• extenuating circumstances will not be accepted unless you can
demonstrate your judgment was impaired
• a deferral or extension may be granted
• proxy marks or other similar devices are not permitted

8. Snags from the students’ point of view
• you must make decision before the exam
• if you leave it too late to get a decision before the exam you risk
a mark of zero being recorded

9. Other considerations
• disability discrimination act
• how quickly can you turn around the decisions?
• might you have to take the decisions centrally?
• ref/def period and international students (Imperial and Edinburgh
expect students to re-sit in the UK. Imperial, Queen Mary’s and
LSE have no re-sit period. Students have to wait until next session)

10. The case of Shelley Mulgrew
Shelley wakes up the day before an exam with stomach ache. The
GP says she has gastro-enteritis and sign a certificate to that effect
• at a University without a Fit to Sit Policy she could sit the exam
and also put in for mitigation
• at a University with a Fit to Sit Policy she must decide whether to
try the exam and underperform or not attend and risk a mark of
zero

11. Fit to Sit : the way of the future ?
Contact me:
Sandi Marshall
01392 722202