• Section 1 - Introduction
• Purpose and Parent Policy
• Responsibilities
• Student Responsibilities
• Staff Responsibilities
• Faculty Responsibilities
• Section 2 - Procedure
• Part A - Procedure for Grading Student Effort
• Assessors
• Grading Schemes, Allocating Marks and Providing Feedback
• Penalties
• Transparency of Assessment Decisions
• Allow for Whole View of Assessment
• Collation and Release of Grades

Section 1 - Introduction

Purpose and Parent Policy

(1) This procedure outlines the steps by which the grading schemes will be implemented, allowing student effort to be assessed under the Assessment, Grading and Certification Policy. 

Responsibilities

Student Responsibilities

(2) The student is responsible for: 

1. Demonstrating their achievement of the learning outcomes
2. Familiarising themselves with the regulations (and consequences thereof) and any other policies and procedures that apply to their programme
3. Complying with all rules and regulations relating to their assessment
4. Undertaking assessments in a fair and honest manner
5. Engaging authentically with feedback

Staff Responsibilities

(3) All Staff involved in the processing of students’ grades are responsible for ensuring that this procedure is implemented.

Faculty Responsibilities

(4) All Faculty and Adjunct Faculty involved in assessing students have responsibility for following this procedure.

(5) The Programme Director or nominee, in consultation with the Registrar, have ultimate responsibility for implementing this procedure. 

Section 2 - Procedure

Part A - Procedure for Grading Student Effort

Assessors

(6) The Programme Director or nominee appoints an Assessor (or team of Assessors) for every summative assessment. The Assessor (or team of Assessors) is:

1. Competent
2. Inducted into the Hibernia College learning environment
3. Contracted by the College

Grading Schemes, Allocating Marks and Providing Feedback

(7) The Assessor compares the student’s effort in the assessment task with a predefined grading scheme, using their academic judgement to determine the marks a student merits.

(8) Grades are always linked to a grading scheme which specifies how student effort should be scored and how the total score is calculated.

(9) Assessors use the full spectrum of marks from 0% to 100%.

(10) Assessors avoid issuing borderline grades in assessment, wherever possible.

(11) Assessors provide feedback in support of their assessment decisions which correlates with the grade awarded.

Penalties

(12) Penalties can be applied to a student's effort for failing to comply with procedural rules for assessment:

1. A student failing to comply with the word-count limits for a piece of continuous assessment work will incur a 10% penalty applied to the marks awarded for the piece of work being assessed.
2. Students who submit continuous assessment work late will normally incur a 10% penalty applied to the marks awarded for the piece of work being assessed. A late submission is defined as a piece of assessment submitted within seven days of the assigned submission date. 
3. Any assessment submitted after seven days post assignment deadline, or not submitted at all, is considered a non-submission. Non-submissions incur a grade of 0%. 

Transparency of Assessment Decisions

(13) It must be clear to the Board of Examiners, and ultimately to the student, based on the grading scheme, how an Assessor arrived at their decision.

(14) The feedback provided must correlate and support the mark awarded. 

Allow for Whole View of Assessment

(15) The final grade for a module is determined by both the combination of the numerical marks awarded for assessments in that module and an academic judgement on the ‘whole view’ of the student’s performance in assessment in that module. This means that the application of a penalty remains subject to an academic judgement about the student’s performance in the assessment.

(16) Where the combination of component-level marks results in a borderline module grade, the grade is internally verified by an Assessor and the mark awarded is placed within a clear grade band, if appropriate.

Collation and Release of Grades

(17) Following grading by the Assessor, students’ grades are collated by the Programme Team and subjected to the Grade Moderation Procedure.

(18) Grades, following grade moderation, are released to students as provisional grades pending confirmation by the Board of Examiners.