Carleton has recently made changes to its examination regulations that will be implemented beginning in the fall exam period.
Course outlines are now required to list information about tests and exams held outside of “regular designated class time.” Take-home examinations will be formally scheduled if the exam is not assigned on or before the last day of classes.
According to Howard Nemiroff, Chair of the Senate Committee on Curriculum, Admissions and Studies Policy at Carleton, having tests that are scheduled outside of class time listed in course outlines makes the examination process more transparent and fair for students. He said the take-home examination change is also meant to help students avoid examination conflicts.
Another major change is that students can also no longer defer an exam once they’ve begun writing it, Nemiroff explained in an email.
If an exam is deferred in the fall semester, he said that students will now be able to rewrite the exam on either Jan. 19-21 and Jan. 26-28, 2018. Previously, deferred exams would have to be rewritten during the winter reading week.
“The exam deferral date was moved forward to give students a more realistic opportunity to perform well,” Nemiroff said. “An earlier deferral date allows for the material to be as fresh as possible.”
Suzanne Blanchard, Carleton’s vice-president (students and enrolment), said in an email how the new deferral date works better for students’ course loads.
“The change to the exam deferral date also avoids students having to write an exam while also studying in a current course load,” she said.
Summative tests or exams will not take place near the end of the term either in order to lessen students’ stress, Nemiroff added.
“The last two weeks of classes present a potentially disproportionately heavy workload for students if they have to prepare for and write a final or summative exam worth a substantial portion of their final grade,” he said.
On the other hand, Carleton still allows formative tests, which measure student progression through learning goals, worth no more than 15 per cent to take place in the last two weeks of the semester because they “provide necessary feedback” to students, Nemiroff said.
There have been no other major changes to the examination regulations in the past few years, according to Blanchard.
Nemiroff noted these changes follow a “fully consultative process” with university administration, individual faculty, and students on the committee responsible for bringing changes to the Senate.
The success of the changes will be determined by measures to “assess the number of deferrals requested, student success in their courses and the requests to the Registrar’s Office around examination conflicts,” Nemiroff said.
Photo by Meagan Casalino
