Coursework
Deadlines, penalties and document limits
Items of coursework, such as essays and write-ups, will normally have strict deadlines. It is YOUR responsibility to ensure that you know both when the deadline for each submission is, and how the work has to be submitted (e.g. on paper to a particular office; electronically to a particular person or site). As your programme is preparing you for the world of graduate employment, where deadlines are often very strict indeed, you should treat School deadlines like train departure times (just a few seconds after the time has passed, it is very likely you will have missed the train!). Unless specifically exempted or mitigated, late submission of any piece of assessed coursework, including Project Reports, will result in a reduction of 10 marks per day (or part thereof beyond the deadline) for 5 days after which a mark of zero will be awarded. Students who submit referral assignments after the deadline will be automatically subject to a mark of zero. Exceeding the specified page limit will result in a deduction of 20 marks per page or part thereof.
Coursework will normally have a specified content limit. This will normally be a number of pages, but in some cases may be a number of words - it is YOUR responsibility to ensure that you understand exactly what the limits are and how they are to be achieved. Again, in post-graduate work you will usually find that documents, such as applications for grants, reports etc., have stringent word or page limit requirements - with line spacing, font, margins etc. specified. The standard School of Biological Sciences instructions for coursework including essays, reports and write-ups follow, but it is YOUR responsibility to ensure that you are aware of any alternative requirements for a particular piece of work:
The [submission] must not exceed [x] pages of text excluding the list of references. Text must be in Arial, 10 point, one and a half line spacing, with margins of at least 2.5 cm all around the text. ALL supporting material, such as figures, tables, text boxes etc. must be included in the page limit, and you are advised to ensure that any such items are sufficiently large enough to be read and understood with ease.
If you prefer to prepare your work in a different font, font size or format you are advised to check frequently that the material will convert to the above for submission, as penalties will normally be imposed for exceeding the limits (e.g. a percentage of marks lost for each page over the limit or part thereof). If the work needs to be converted to a PDF for submission you should check very carefully that the conversion is accurate and conforms to the guidelines well in advance of the submission deadline.
Time Management
Some deadlines may be shortly after the delivery of the material, some quite a way off, and this may well differ for different cohorts of students. This mixture mirrors the graduate world of work, and the requirements of your final year programme, so you are advised to plan ahead! Anticipate a few days of ill-health that might impact on your ability to complete assignments on time, and start wok early on items with far-off deadlines. Mastering time management is one of the most essential goals you should set yourself. To help you, every course where there are assessments/assignments/deadlines will have all the deadline dates available to you within the ‘Assessments’ area of Blackboard in the left hand menu. Any non-course-specific deadlines, such as essays, can be found in the Tutorials courses on Blackboard. Please note that it is possible that some dates may be adjusted throughout the semester at the Unit Coordinators discretion, therefore you should check your deadlines for each course regularly and complete work as early as possible.
Plagiarism, collusion and other forms of academic malpractice
These topics form an important part of the first stage of the Writing and Referencing skills modules in Y1 & 2 but general guidelines and advice are given hereunder.
Plagiarism is a serious offence - it is treated as seriously as cheating in exams.
- As a student, you are expected to cooperate in the learning process throughout your programme of study by completing assignments of various kinds that are the product of your own study or research. Coursework, dissertations and essays submitted for assessment must be your own work, unless in the case of group projects a joint effort is expected and this has been indicated by the Unit Coordinator. For most students this does not present a problem, but occasionally, whether unwittingly or otherwise, a student may commit what is known as plagiarism, or some other form of academic malpractice, when carrying out an assignment. This may come about because students have been used to different conventions in their prior educational experience or through general ignorance of what is expected of them or of what constitutes plagiarism.
- This guidance is designed to help you understand what we regard as academic malpractice and hence to help you to avoid committing it. You should read it carefully, because academic malpractice is regarded as a serious offence and students found to have committed it will be penalized. At the very least a mark of only 30% would be awarded for the piece of work in question, but it could be worse; you could be awarded zero (with or without loss of credits), fail the whole unit, be demoted to a lower class of degree, or be excluded from the programme, depending on the severity of the case.
Academic malpractice includes plagiarism, collusion, fabrication or falsification of results and anything else intended by those committing it to achieve credit that they do not properly deserve. You will be given exercises and guidance on plagiarism/academic malpractice in tutorials and if you are unsure about any aspect of this you should ask your Academic Tutor for advice. In addition, further guidance is available on the intranet (see ‘Plagiarism - Resources for avoiding Plagiarism’ which includes helpful exercises and explanations relating to plagiarism and referencing on the web. There is also information in My Learning Essentials. It is well worth visiting these sites in your spare time to ensure that you fully understand.
All students are required to confirm that they have read and agree to the University’s declaration on Academic Malpractice as part of the online registration process.
Further information on Academic Malpractice and how to avoid it can be found at www.regulations.manchester.ac.uk/guidance-to-students-on-plagiarism-and-other-forms-of-academic-malpractice/.
The University uses electronic systems for the purposes of detecting plagiarism and other forms of academic malpractice and for marking. Such systems include TurnitinUK, the plagiarism detection service used by the University.
As part of the formative and/or summative assessment process, you may be asked to submit electronic versions of your work to TurnitinUK and/or other electronic systems used by the University (this requirement may be in addition to a requirement to submit a paper copy of your work). If you are asked to do this, you must do so within the required timescales.
The School also reserves the right to submit work handed in by you for formative or summative assessment to TurnitinUK and/or other electronic systems used by the University.
Please note that when work is submitted to the relevant electronic systems, it may be copied and then stored in a database to allow appropriate checks to be made.
You will be given an opportunity within the tutorials to submit a draft essay through this system, and it is very much in your best interests to do this so that you understand how it works.
Please see the document Guidance to students on plagiarism and other forms of academic malpractice.
eLearning (Blackboard)
As a student at the University of Manchester, you will find that many of your units contain sections of work that you have to complete online (known as electronic (e)Learning). The University uses a website-like environment for this called Blackboard.
Online eLearning support for your course means that it is easy to fit your learning into your everyday life, as you can complete the work from almost any computer in the world with an internet connection. We are encouraging the use of students’ own mobile devices to support teaching and learning in lectures and tutorials. However, if the session requires a mobile device and you do not have one, one will be supplied.
Your eLearning work will often have strict deadlines and marks will be awarded for successful completion of assessments. Every Blackboard course is different, so read the rules regarding the course before you start, to ensure that you don’t miss any work.
Technical support from the eLearning team is available between 9:00 and 17:00 on all working days. This is accessible by selecting ‘Technical Support’ and then ‘eLearning enquiries’ from the menu bar on the left of your online courses; the eLearning team will reply to your University email address.
More information on eLearning in the Faculty of Biology, Medicine and Health can be found here http://bmh-elearning.org./technical-support/.
Research Projects
During Year 4 of your MSci degree, you will complete a seven month research project based on one of the two research project proposals you wrote during Year 3. Through this project you will receive a comprehensive training in relevant research methods, data analysis and interpretation of results. You will also learn how lines of scientific research are developed and how it can be necessary at times to adapt your initial hypothesis in the light of results. You will present your project and results as a scientific talk, meeting abstract, poster presentation and a report in the format of an appropriate journal.
Aims of research projects
To allow you to gain experience in:
- analysing complex biological processes at cellular, whole organism or ecosystem levels to generate novel and timely hypotheses
- designing experimental approaches to address these hypotheses.
- interpreting complex experiments.
- using diverse experimental approaches.
- interpreting multiple lines of evidence to test a hypothesis.
- problem solving.
- working independently or as part of a group/team as required to address a particular bioscience question or topic.
- current life science methodologies appropriate to your MSci degree programme.
- developing critical and creative thinking skills (develop ideas, data analysis and evaluation skills)
- literature searching and critically reviewing the literature in a particular field, and relating your own research to that in the existing literature
- project management (managing your time, planning, meeting deadlines and milestones, addressing challenges, producing deliverables)
- communicating your results as a scientific talk, meeting abstract, poster presentation and manuscript.
Allocation
You should have completed and handed in a Project Preference Form at the end of Semester 6 in your third year to indicate which of the two project proposals you want to pursue as your research project during Year 4. This selection should have been done in consultation with your Programme Director. If you didn’t complete and hand-in a Project Preference Form by the appropriate date, you will be allocated a project with one of the two supervisors with whom you have completed your research project proposals. We will endeavour to allocate students to their first choice of project.
Content, assessment and penalties
Detailed information on the content and assessment criteria can be found on the Blackboard page for BIOL40010 MSci Research Project. Your work will be marked by your supervisor and moderated by another member of staff. Over-length submissions will be subject to a penalty of 20 marks per page (or part thereof) over the limit. Submission dates are given on the front page of this handbook. Late submission will be penalised; if you miss the deadline you will lose 10 marks per day (or part thereof). N.B. Printer or computer failures are NOT valid reasons for seeking an extension see section Submission below). The same applies to theft of pcs, laptops, discs, memory sticks, etc - always back up your files on the p-drive, in cloud storage, or keep back-up copies in a location distant from your computer.
Projects involving humans and other animals
You should have completed a brief Ethics Survey for each of your Research Project Proposals to determine whether your project requires ethical approval.
Any project using human tissue or data relating to humans MUST be covered by ethical approval. This takes time, and it is YOUR responsibility to ensure that the survey, and any subsequent application, is submitted in a timely fashion and that NO work on humans is carried out until approval has been given. Further information and the relevant forms are available on the Blackboard page for BIOL33000 MSci Research Project Proposal.
In other projects, you may need to undertake techniques that are covered by the Animals (Scientific Procedures) Act, 1986. It is your responsibility, and that of your supervisor, to ensure that you have a Personal Licence under the Act and that all necessary techniques are detailed on that Licence.
Amount and timing of the work
It is important that you spend an appropriate amount of time on your Research Project. It is recommended that you spend at least 35-40 hours per week on project work. Also, as the Research Project is a 120 credit unit, you should expect to spend a total of 1200 hours on project work. Students must liaise closely with their Supervisor(s) regarding periods that can be spent actively performing experiments (either ‘wet’ or computational). This is because undergraduates MUST be supervised by a member of University staff AT ALL TIMES when working in any laboratory. You may work on University campus after normal hours (i.e., after 17.00hrs) but you MUST written permission and be supervised by a member of University Staff. You will need to discuss with your supervisor obtaining the required permission to work outside of normal working hours.
N.B. All laboratory-based projects must be subject to a risk assessment, prior to starting work – see section Health and Safety and also https://app.bmh.manchester.ac.uk/hs/coshh/default.aspx.
Suggested Stages to your project
- Meet with your supervisor during Welcome Week to discuss starting of your Research Project.
- Complete Lab Induction including reading and signing all COSHH and risk assessment forms for work you will be undertaking before starting ANY work.
- Begin work on your project in week 1 of semester 7; this may involve shadowing staff, learning how to use equipment or software, growing plants or culturing cells, making up solutions, etc.
- Seek support: at the outset of practical work you may need day-to-day help from post-docs, postgrads, your supervisor or other staff; eventually you should become more independent. Also, talk about your work to fellow students and think about what you are doing and why you are doing it.
- Attend supporting seminars. Ensure that you are aware of the dates of relevant research seminars, workshops and/or lab meetings, plus submission deadlines, and attend seminars appropriate for your project type
- Perform a literature survey and continue looking for new literature relevant to your project throughout the academic year. Keep detailed records of all the sources you consult (see Section Plagiarism, collusion and other forms of academic malpractice). References are best stored using bibliographic software like Endnote. If you have not used this before, or have forgotten how, you can consult the archives for BIOL21701 Critical Writing Skills on Blackboard. You must be aware of copyright restrictions on the use of images in your project and reference images accordingly, or acknowledge the sources of images that are freely available under a Creative Commons copyright license.
- Record your progress daily in your Lab book (experimental details, notes from meetings, ideas, to-do lists, progress, challenges etc). Write critical comments on your results. Draw conclusions and plan future work. Your supervisor will probably want to see your Lab book and discuss your progress and results. Analysing data and assembling figures as you go along, where appropriate, will help you to plan the next stage of the project.
- Review progress with your Research Project at regular intervals. Try to generate your own ideas for your research if appropriate, but always discuss these with your supervisor before you do the work. Plan ahead especially if you have a number of concurrent tasks to deal with.
- Meet with your supervisor regularly. Make appointments to discuss your ideas, progress and results with your supervisor at regular intervals.
- Finish your project work before the end of March if possible in order to allow sufficient time for report writing and obtaining feedback on a full draft of your report.
If, for reasons beyond your control, your project fails to give adequate results, you will not be penalised or disadvantaged.
Feedback
All types of projects include an element of formative feedback – an opportunity for you to submit material, e.g., an outline, and get feedback from your supervisor that will allow you to improve on submissions for summative feedback (observations and marks which contribute towards your final marks). It is in your best interests that you seek an appointment specifically for this purpose and your responsibility to arrange it at a mutually convenient time.
Submission
Dates of submission of major pieces of written work are cited on the front page of this handbook. You will receive further information on the format of each submission nearer the time, via email; you will be required to submit your project report electronically.
The deadlines will be strictly enforced. Late submission will not be permitted without an approved extension accompanied by appropriate documentation. Your supervisor CANNOT grant an extension for submission of a literature review or project report – this can only be done by the Senior Advisor. It is your responsibility to familiarise yourself with any additional submission requirements of your project.
Assessment
Your Research Project will be assessed through the following:
- a 10 minute scientific talk followed by 5 minutes of questions, describing the background and aims to your project, the results you have obtained, and the conclusions you can draw from your work (10%)
- submission of a 150 word meeting abstract describing the Research Project (5%)
- preparation and presentation of A1 that is suitable for an international scientific conference (20%)
- project performance (15%)
- a 25 page project report in the format of an appropriate journal for your MSci degree programme (50%)
Guidelines on feedback to students
Feedback is a broad term, which can be interpreted in different ways. The purpose of this section is to define the activities associated with feedback mechanisms, as they relate to lecture-based BIOL units so that you are aware of the feedback available for any unit which you decide to take.
Lecturers are expected to provide general guidance to students on appropriate reading material and other learning resources for the unit in advance of the start of the unit on Blackboard.
We encourage you to ask questions both during lectures or later during the year when, for example, you are revising for exams. However, if the lecture course has finished, then we suggest that you seek confirmation of the answer to your own question. What do we mean by this? Lecturers are unlikely to respond favourably to questions phrased along the lines of ‘Can you tell me the answer to this? Thus, if you want to ask a question, particularly by email, please make sure you include your own interpretation of the answer, including the literature sources that you used, and ask only for confirmation that you are correct. For example:
Wrong format: Can you tell me the primary role of voltage-gated sodium channels?
Correct format: It is my understanding that voltage-gated sodium channels are primarily responsible for the depolarising phase of the action potential. I used Kandel’s Principles of Neuroscience to obtain this information. Is this correct?
NB: The School does not normally publish marking schemes or answers to examination questions - you are expected to deduce these yourself using text books, peers, and PASS sessions.
In addition to providing the mandatory level of feedback, Unit Coordinators may provide more detailed feedback on your work. You should consult the feedback entry within the unit description in this handbook for further details on the additional feedback provided.
Examination feedback
Students have a right to receive feedback on their examination performance from Unit Coordinators. This may be done in a number of ways. A Unit Coordinator may
- publish a general feedback document outlining how questions were answered, addressing general strengths and weaknesses of students and giving a general indication of how well the questions were answered.
- hold a feedback session, to which students are invited.
- review an answer paper for a student and summarise his/her feedback via email.
- provide online feedback.
A student may seek individual feedback, in which the Unit Coordinator will obtain their exam scripts and report feedback on their answers including, where appropriate, any written comments recorded on the manuscript. A student does not, however, have the right to challenge any academic judgements on the quality of the answer. This means there is NO opportunity for papers to be re-marked.