BOARD OF THE FACULTY OF LAW AND MANAGEMENT
Wednesday 21November 2012
(2.00pm-4.00pm)
APPROVED MINUTES
Chair / Dr Luther, Dean of the Faculty of Law and Management
Present / Dr Abou-Seada, Dr Calley, Dr Daly,Dr Frandsen, Dr Hardiman-McCartney, Dr Warhurst
Apologies / Professor Patrick, Dr Johns, Mr Oyewole.
Secretary / Mr de Sousa, Academic Officer
In attendance / Miss Hammond, Miss Dobson-McKittrick.
STARRING OF AGENDA ITEMS
Noted / Items starred in addition to those already starred on the agenda:
14) Any other business. / 66/12
MINUTES OF THE LAST MEETING
Approved / The minutes of the meeting held on 23 May 2012 were approved. / 67/12
MATTERS ARISING
Discussed / Rules of Assessment Working Group
Minute 36/12: Further changes to the Rules of Assessment were approved by Senate, to be applicable to all students this academic year (details of which had been published in the updated Rules of Assessment web pages). The approved changes would create an additional two years of complexity, whereby the most beneficial rules would be used to calculate students’ degree class. Briefing sessions would be held with staff to explain the application of the rules of assessment before Boards of Examiners met. / 68/12
International Academy
Minute 40/12: Discussions on the future of the International Academy had concluded with a decision to continue with the Centre, with a newActing Director, Richard Barnard. / 69/12
Attendance Monitoring
Minute 46/12: A pilot was introduced to test a new electronic attendance monitoring system involving at least two Schools. There were some challenges in its early stages of implementation due to conflicting influences on attendance monitoring matters including Tier 4 visa related issues. However, the potential benefits of an electronic system include improvements in resources and accuracy of data, which would especially benefit the larger departments. / 70/12
Annual Monitoring Report
Minute48/12: It was still unclear as to whether the undergraduate Essex Business School Annual Monitoring Report had been submitted for consideration, though the Board had been provided with the postgraduate report for consideration at this meeting. / 71/12
Coursework Deadline and Marks Penalty policy
Minute 53/12: A coursework deadline policy proposal from the Business School was considered by Academic Board, but due to a lack of a formal mechanism for a School to propose such a change and concerns over a change to the policy at this time, the proposal was not approved, but it was agreed that there should be further consideration of the issue at a future meeting. Schools in the Faculty have been asked to review their current implementation of the existing policy, which allows departments (Schools) to choose between versions set within a framework. / 72/12
Courses with a Placement Year
Minute 55/12: The new BSc Management and Marketing (with a Placement Year), was used over the summer as a reference for a generic work based placement year for any department to change any three year course into one with a work-based placement. Generic criteria was agreed to allow departments to implement this as easily as possible in terms of the requirements of the approval process. / 73/12
It was noted that the University considered applying a requirement of a mark of 60 to progress but this was declined and a universal policy was yet to be reached. Board members felt that there could be an argument to vary the progression requirements by course for pedagogic purposes. It was noted that such additional requirements often caused difficulties for Boards of Examiners in making decisions on student progress. However, the course placement model was thought to have been very popular with potential applicants and parents of applicants as has been seen at open days, notwithstanding the increase in tuition fees and the additional cost of another year at university. / 74/12
MEMBERSHIP AND TERMS OF REFERENCE
Approved / 75/12
MEMBERSHIP OF PROGRESS PANELS AND ACADEMIC OFFENCES COMMITTEES
Approved / 76/12
REPORT OF DEAN’S ACTION TAKEN ON BEHALF OF THE BOARD
Noted / 77/12
DEAN’S REPORT
Reported / Review of Faculty Structure
The University was engaged in a review of the Faculty structure, with a view to reducing the number of faculties though it was unknown which faculty or faculties would be discontinued. Recommendations were expected to be published at the start of the Spring Term. There was also a review of the committee structures under Senate, which would likely be concluded by the end of the current academic year. The culmination of these is likely to mean that the Faculty may look very different next year, as would the Faculty Board. / 78/12
Reported / Marking Policy Review
A Task and Finish Group was required to review the marking and coursework appeals policies operating within the University.The University’s current policies werebelieved to be quite different to those of other universities. / 79/12
UNDERGRADUATEEXTERNAL EXAMINERS’ REPORTS
Discussed / The circulation of external examiners reports was different between Schools, with varying levels of success. The School of Law usually discussed the contents of reports at meetings where students were in attendance (as unreserved matters) and this was found to have been a useful way to obtain direct feedback and suggestions for improvement. It was suggested that the method of distribution should be reviewed for all departments, as well as the general way in which reports were handled. / 80/12
Discussed / Essex Business School
The Chair reported that most of the external examiners seemed entirely satisfied with the courses and their administration. One report raised the suggestion of increasing assessment diversification, which could benefit students in terms of their engagement with the course. Furthermore, concerns were raised in relation to marking and feedback but this was a frequently raised issue and it was noted that the Business School had discussed it on a number of occasions and would continue its attempts to improve in this area. The grid feedback tool (with a tick-box scale) for example, was suggested to have been unproductive, with differences between the marks on the grid when compared against the comments, potentially leading to conflicting feedback. It was suggested that the grid could be replaced by a system of categorised comments in order to prevent confusion and help clarify the context of the feedback. / 81/12
Some members of the Board suggested that the grid box could be a useful tool when used correctly, and markers should ensure coherence between comments and tick-box responses. Large departments, or modules with large cohorts, might find it difficult to implement a more time-consuming semi-structured comments system. / 82/12
The same external raised the possibility of ranking students’ performance for the Boards of Examiners. The external(s) could then comment on the quality of the provision and resultant effect on the students, and it might also be used to note on student transcripts. Pragmatic issues, such as the capability of the student database to do this, would need to be considered as well as wider policy related matters. / 83/12
Another external for the Business School queried the role of the pre-board in terms of discussing complex and contentious cases so as to avoid raising them at the Board itself. It was suggested that the Board should be prevented from re-opening any recommendations from the pre-board, but members of the Faculty Board did not support this view. The Board agreed that some circumstances should not be re-opened or discussed in detail, though to prevent any disagreement or discussion from taking place would be counterproductive given that discretion could only be applied on the basis of the consideration of extenuating circumstances. / 84/12
Discussed / School of Law
An external suggested that the University should consider preventing students from continuing on a course when s/he was likely to fail the year, due to the possibility of setting them up for failure. Board members noted that the Rules of Assessment dealt with this issue in conjunction with the progress regulations. It was clarified that the rules of assessment limited the number of times students were able to repeat the year, with a threshold limit of a year (stage) mark of 20% where a student would be required to withdraw without reassessment. Warnings to students published with their results with the implication of possibly failing were thought to have been effective and appeared to have been successful (based on anecdotal evidence). / 85/12
86/12
One report stated that all Law modules provided examples of best practice and was very satisfied with the courses on offer. The same report asked for clarification of the process for how an external would query what might appear to be a single aberrant mark, given that this was not currently within the remit of an external. The Board agreed that this was a concern, though it was thought that the External should discuss this with the relevant Head of School if this occurred. / 87/12
It was noted that other external examiners were very satisfied with all aspects of courses, the Schools and the administrative support. / 88/12
ANNUAL MONITORING REPORT
Discussed / Essex Business School
Many of the items on the Annual Monitoring Report had been actioned and dealt with because the report was sent to a much later Board than usual. It was noted that feedback time and quality was again an area of concern, as was usually the case in most departments and courses, but no other substantive issues were required to be discussed further. It was noted that a substantial restructuring of PGT provision had been accomplished and also helped to address many of the issues raised. / 89/12
STUENT SURVEY RESULTS: NSS and PTES
Discussed / It was noted that the same statistical results would be discussed at various other committees involving many of the same individuals from the Faculty Board, so detailed repetition of discussion at this meeting was believed to be unnecessary. A Green Paper had been drafted within EBS with proposals to address some of the issues arising out of the statistics. / 90/12
Table 2 showed that Essex’s general satisfaction was within the top quintile, though the individual sub-section results were not as positive. Table 3 displayed a more negative response for the Faculty in particular. The Board discussed some of the pragmatic difficulties and nuances of conducting such surveys, for example, that students who were indifferent in their opinion on a topic would likely tick the middle box in the survey that would result in a negative analysis of the answer, because only the top answers would be regarded as positive for the statistical analysis. Students should be encouraged to use ‘not applicable’ if indifferent on a particular matter. It was noted that the negative effects of such surveys upon the impression of Essex graduates to employers was important and potentially problematic with such figures. The time that the surveys typically took place was also discussed, where delaying the survey time or just considering the academic cycle so as to not require students to take part when busy with assignment deadlines might encourage students to participate and to provide a more balanced view. / 91/12
Anecdotal evidence shows that students sometimes used such surveys to replace other formal reporting and discussion forums such as Staff Student Liaison Committee, where a simple misunderstanding might affect such results and analysis. Emphasising the purpose of the surveys, perhaps from fellow students, was viewed as essential. / 92/12
The response rate of surveys was thought also to have been a valid area of analysis that did not appear to have been part of the provided analysis. / 93/12
Members of the Board suggested that the development of the survey methodology could be improved by involving academics with specialism in social sciences research methods, which was a recognised strength of the University. / 94/12
PERIODIC REVIEWS
Discussed / School of Law
It was noted that student representatives seemed dissatisfied with the appeals process and that it was regarded as not clearly published or accessible. Members of the Board from the School of Law reported that the appeals process was published on-line and on hard copy in handbooks. The marking process itself was thought to have been clear, and the School was in-line with University requirements. / 95/12
Nonetheless, the conditions placed upon the School had already been actioned and noted as such in the report. / 96/12
Recommended to Senate: / That the following courses be approved to continue until the next cycle of review and/or validation (conditions made had already been met):
LLB Law
LLB Laws (international exchange)
LLB Law and Politics
LLB Law and Human Rights
LLB Law and Philosophy
LLB English and French Law
BA Law and Human Rights
BA Philosophy and Law
BA Politics and Law / 97/12
Discussed / Essex Business School
The Chair of the Board noted that the reflective document from the periodic review was extremely useful, well written and self-critical. The main item discussed from the report was with regards to the difference between the campuses in their designation of first year modules as either Core of Compulsory. There was little recollection that this was exactly the outcome of the meeting, though it was noted that the School operated differently across campuses. / 98/12
The report also raised the possibility of mid-year examinations for Autumn Term modules, in order to reduce the length of time students had to wait between studying the module and the final assessment. The University had already formed a working group to look at the matter for the university as a whole as this was an increasing concern. The Board accepted that there were many issues to consider, including reassessment and practical Board of Examiners issues before a decision could be made. / 99/12
Recommended to Senate: / That the following courses be approved to continue until the next cycle of reviews:
BA Accounting
BA Accounting with Economics
BA Accounting and Finance
BA Accounting and Management
BSc Banking and Finance
BSc Finance
BSc Financial Management
BSc Business Management
BA Business Management and Modern Languages
BA Business Management with Modern Languages
BSc Management and Marketing
BA Sociology and Management
BSc Marketing
BBA Business Administration
BSc International Enterprise and Entrepreneurship / 100/12
NEW COURSE
Discussed / LLM Economic, Social and Cultural Rights
The Board approved the proposal, subject to the submission of the Part 2 checklist document, which would be reviewed by the Chair on behalf of the Board. The rest of the documentation submitted was considered to be very satisfactory and the course was viewed as a positive addition to the School’s portfolio. / 101/12
The Board wished to thank the External Assessor in particular for the contribution towards the development of the new course and the comments made. / 102/12
Recommended to Senate: / To recommend the following course for approval with effect from October 2013:
LLM Economic, Social and Cultural Rights / 103/12
STUDENT MATTERS
Noted / There was no business to report, though the Board noted an unfortunate lack of student representatives at the Board. No representatives had appeared to have been elected in addition to the Convenor. The Board noted that students had made very useful contributions to past meetings of the Board. / 104/12
ANY OTHER BUSINESS
Discussed /
EBS Periodic Review
It was reported that the Business School recently requested to move their pending review to the following academic year to allow for the changes in staffing, module credits sizes and course structure. The Board had no objection to the request, though it was uncertain that the power to grant permission for this deferral was held with the Board.
/ 105/12Dan de Sousa
Academic Officer
November 2012