At the University of Manchester, students have to contact the Disability
Support Office (DSO) and supply evidence of a disability. This triggers off
all the usual support , eg DSAs, dept support, exams etc. All exam
arrangements for students with additional needs are administered through the
DSO. Students with the 'standard' extra time are timetabled through the
central awards & examinations office, as per all other students, and their
exams are located in 'extra time rooms'. All the others, ie those with a
wide variety of different needs are administered through the DSO. The
University has just appointed a full-time examinations officer in the DSO to
deal with this workload. All of these students take their exams in a
special examination room, very close to the DSO, or in individual rooms with
access to toilets, rest areas, specialist PCs, equipment etc etc.
Invigilators are provided centrally from the University administration.
The proximity of the rooms to the DSO also means that students are fully
supported with whatever support needs they have.
This is a fairly new procedure (last year was the first full year) and it
created a lot of extra work for the Office, hence the additional FT post to
support this. However, the feedback and monitoring of this service from
students has been extremely positive.
As an aside, we have tried in the past to add on extra time to standard
length exams, but students complained that the noise of others leaving
distracted them. We then tried stopping the clock and re-starting the extra
time when the other students had vacated the room, but this casued further
lack of concentration and disturbance. We have also tried locating some
exams in individual departments. The system we have now adopted has been
widely accepted by students and seems to work very well.
Elaine Shillcock
Head, Disability Support Office
email [log in to unmask]
-----Original Message-----
From: Discussion list for disabled students and their support staff.
[mailto:[log in to unmask]]On Behalf Of BRYAN JONES
Sent: 18 October 2002 13:50
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Exams
How do other institutions administer the exams for students with
disabilities? Some HEIs (ours included) ask students to identify
themselves before each exam diet. Reason being that setting up
special facilities takes time and money and one cannot assume
that the student is still around, hasn't changed modules without
informing the all the correct people, actually has a written exam
that time round, etc. Given that the DDA is with us now, I'm not
sure that asking students to come forward twice a year is
acceptable. What do others do / think?
Bryan Jones
Disability Support Services Manager
Tel: 020 8411 5367
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