Week of action grows support for feedback campaign

Over 300 students have given their views in a consultation on assignment feedback

Students joined the Union's education officer, Sarah Delli-Colli (pictured centre), for the day of action

Students have been joining a growing campaign to demand better assignment feedback from the University.

 

A day of action in the Students’ Union saw UCLan students take the chance to hand in examples of their assignment feedback and give their view on what feedback is expected in the 15 day turnaround stated on ‘The Card’ given out by the University.

 

A mock referendum about whether they felt overall feedback was good or bad from the University was also held.

 

Sarah Delli-Colli, former education officer, who was leading The Good, The Bad & The Feedback campaign, said: “Students deserve the right to receive good constructive feedback so that they are able to improve their work and see a progression in their marks.

 

“Of course, there are areas of the University where feedback is fantastic but there are others where it is not. We need to uncover these areas of good practice so the University can learn from them and give every student the same good quality education.

 

“There is no reason why students at the same institution should be getting such different levels of service.”

 

Ballots were cast by students asking them to rate their overall feedback as good or bad

The campaign has also been running online with nearly 200 students completing an online questionnaire asking for their views on feedback.

 

One student said: “Feedback should be given back within 15 days as agreed on the UCLan card but this is not always the case. Being a student you are expected to stick to a deadline and so naturally you expect the marker to do the same.”

 

The comments on assignment feedback have varied greatly from course to course, with some students praising the level of feedback from lecturers.

 

One student said: “The tutors on my course are very helpful and approachable so I never feel alone or disheartened after feedback and I always know I can contact them if I need to.”

 

All assignment feedback handed in has been anonymised to protect the identity of lecturers and students.

 

The Union now plans to analyse the views given by students and present the findings to UCLan’s senior management team on Monday 2nd February 2009 and demand action is taken to improve the level of feedback given on assignments across the institution.

 

The campaign was started after the Union discovered in the 2008 National Student Survey that 43 per cent of UCLan students were dissatisfied with the promptness of assignment feedback and further research for the Student Written Submission 2008 confirmed this feeling amongst students.

23 January 2009