Checking your exam access recommendations

The person marking your written work should be aware that you may make errors in the technical accuracy of your written English for reasons relating to your disability. The marker should take this into consideration when providing feedback on your written work.

You should be provided with an explanation within your feedback if your use of written expression has affected your marks and you should be provided with clear advice on how to develop any areas of weakness. Refer to the Policy on the Assessment of Written Work.

This means that the evidence you provided to us does not clearly indicate that you are disabled. However, it has allowed us to put in place permanent exam arrangements on the basis of the arrangements you had at school, college, or in other previous study.

This code will be removed if you provide additional evidence, and we will advise you how to do this.

This means that your exam recommendations have been made on a temporary basis only. You will need to provide updated information for these to become permanent.

This means that you did not register with us, and/or send us sufficient evidence before the exam deadline. Your exam arrangements won’t be in place for the next set of exams, but they will be in place for all future exams.

The instructions and carrier language of the exam paper will be modified to ensure they are clear and written in plain English. This recommendation may be made for autistic students.

This is also known as a scribe. Students working with a scribe dictate their answers to the scribe, who writes them down.

These are rest breaks. The usual recommendations is for breaks of up to 10 minutes per hour, to be used flexibly. They are ‘stop-the-clock’ breaks, where the break time is added on to the end of the exam.

This is where the invigilator is known to the student, often their Specialist Mentor. This recommendation may be made for autistic students.

It is not often possible to arrange for students to sit their exams in a room on their own. However, we can recommend smaller rooms (e.g. up to 5 people, or fewer than 25 people).

This recommendation indicates that you need arrangements for a particular type of exams, for example, multiple choice instead of essay based, oral instead of written.

This code acknowledges those students who have provided us with some level of evidence which may indicate disability, but further evidence is required. This code means that we have put in place basic, interim exam arrangements which will stay in place until you are able to provide full evidence.

We will advise you further about the evidence you need to obtain, and of any deadlines relating to this.

Disability Services makes recommendations only. The Exams Office is responsible for ensuring the necessary arrangements are made. Whilst the vast majority of recommendations made by Disability Services will be put in place by the Exams Office, there are some instances where the Exams Office may not be able to make the recommended adjustments.

If you are concerned that you do not have an arrangement in place you were expecting, please raise this by emailing Disability Services at disability@leeds.ac.uk or by emailing the Exams Office at examinations@leeds.ac.uk.  

The recommendations made by Disability Services should be considered for all forms of timed assessment. This includes in-course assessment (class tests) as well as formal University exams.

However, you may need to check your arrangements for in course assessment with your module leader or the Disability Contact in your School to ensure your arrangements are in place.  You do not need to do this for formal University exams. 

Most assessment should be offered within a 48-hour window. The does not mean that you are expected to work for 48 hours.

Module leaders will clearly state specific detail of expected word count and/or the amount of time they might expect a student to spend writing their paper within the rubric of the paper. If you usually have an extra time allowance, this 48-hour window will incorporate that extra time, along with rest break allowances where relevant.

Any assessment with a completion window of less than 48 hours must be calculated to include the additional time allowance and/or rest breaks you are entitled to.  You should discuss this with your Module Leader or Disability Contact.  

You may usually have a recommendation to work with an Exam Support Worker, such as a Scribe/Amanuensis, a Reader, or a Prompter. This is because the University does not allow access to most types of assistive software in campus-based, closed-book examinations.

In an online assessment environment, you should be allowed full access to all your assistive software, including screen readers, speech to text software, prompting software, screen tinting software and, in almost all cases, literacy software.

You might be used to working with your assistive software on a daily basis, and you may find this preferable to human support.  

If your online assessment is ‘proctored’ (supervised remotely using software), it may mean that you cannot use your assistive software. If this applies to you, you should talk with your Module Leader or Disability Contact to agree an alternative assessment which allows for the use of assistive technology. 

If you use British Sign Language interpretation or you have transcribed papers, you will still have access to these types of support. 
 

Due to the high number of exam recommendations processed by Disability Services, there may be a delay in adding your recommendations to the system, or finalising those recommendations which require further discussion. For this reason, your final exam recommendations may not be visible on Minerva until the start of Teaching Week 10.

You are advised to check your exam recommendations in Week 10, and email Disability Services at disability@leeds.ac.uk if they are incorrect or incomplete. 

Your School may have scheduled tests, timed assessments or examinations outside the formal University Exam Sessions which take place in January, May/June or during the August resit period.

If you have recently registered with Disability Services and your test or timed assessment takes place before teaching Week 10, your exam arrangement recommendations might not yet be recorded on the system.

If this happens, you should contact the Disability Contact in your school to discuss informal school-based arrangements such as extra writing time or rest breaks.