Teaching
Before teaching
The teaching must be organised on the basis of the description in the programme regulations/course description.
It is not permitted to organise according to other criteria than those that are described in the programme regulations/course description.
You may find the programme regulations/course description on SDU’s website for students. If in doubt, you can ask the degree programme secretary.
The programme regulations will typically state something about the content of the instruction, especially forms of work in the subject and the scope of the examination syllabus. There will also be a detailed description of the objectives for the subject and a description of how the examination is to be carried out. If you have further subject-specific questions, you must contact the Head of Studies.
A course description for an elective subject must comply with the faculty’s guidelines for preparing a description of objectives and exam regulations. See the template here.
The course description must be approved by the study board. If you have questions about the preparation of the course description, you must contact the Head of Studies, who can refer you to the person responsible for the course.
The programme regulations/course description will state whether class attendance is part of the examination type. Class attendance is included in the assessment of the exam performance only if it is specifically stated in the course description.
The spring semester starts on 1 February.
The autumn semester starts on 1 September.
All communication with the students takes place via the Blackboard IT platform.
When your employment contract has been signed, you can be given access.
Contact IT service or Blackboard support for help.
If you have any difficulty in finding the course regulations the degree programme secretary will be happy to help and send “individual” and direct links.
You may also use the following links:
Bachelor: https://mitsdu.dk/da/mit_studie/bachelor / choose the relevant study link / click on Undervisning (on your right hand) and then Udbudte fag/kurser
Minor subject: https://mitsdu.dk/da/mit_studie/tilvalg_sidefag / choose the relevant study link / click on Undervisning (on your right hand) and then Udbudte fag/kurser
Master: https://mitsdu.dk/da/mit_studie/kandidat /choose the relevant study link / click on Undervisning (on your right hand) and then Udbudte fag/kurser
During teaching
See the website for information about public holidays in Denmark.
- Spring semester: Exams are held in June and the re-examinations in August.
- Fall semester: Exams are held in January, with re-examinations in February.
Always ask the examination secretary to get the exact dates.
During the first three weeks after the start of the semester, the students may switch to another elective subject.
If they wish to change electives after the first three weeks, they must apply for an exemption from the study board.
If you are ill, you are required to inform the students via the Itslearning IT platform and to contact the degree programme secretary so that she also is informed.
In case the class has to be moved, contact the degree programme secretary so that new rooms may be booked. Please inform the students about the new times and rooms via Itslearning.
You are required to evaluate teaching in writing via an electronic form, and you must plan to spend time on this at the end of the course.
You will receive more information from your degree programme secretary.
You may also find guidelines about the EVAL system here.
A student who has not fulfilled the requirements regarding teaching and exam regulations due to illness or other unusual conditions should contact the study board for a dispensation.
It may be possible to give more time for an exam or to postpone the submission deadline.
If the student is ill at the time of the exam, he or she must notify Registration and Legality (the examinations office) via SPOC.
The university instructor is not authorized to give permission for these things him- or herself.
At the beginning of the course, all students will be informed about the rules for good academic practice, so they should know the rules – and cannot claim ignorance.
If you wish to remind them about the rules, you can refer them to this web page . You may inform them that it is their own responsibility to know the rules and that violations have consequences. Ignorance will not be recognized as an excuse.
Examination
Before the exam
The examination must be organised based on the description that is in the course description and in the curriculum.
The course description can be found both in the course room in Itslearning and on the programme page on MitSDU under Udbudte kurser.
The curriculum can be found on the programme page on MitSDU under Curriculum.
It is not allowed to test according to criteria other than what is described in the curriculum/course description.
The course description describe the formal requirements for the exam, for example, the number of pages that the exam paper must have. The curriculum clearly state definitions for the number of keystrokes for a standard page and what should be counted.
The students must use a special front page (supplied by the secretary, stating the specific requirements) when they submit written assignments. Here, the students must state the number of keystrokes, amongst other things.
If an exam paper does not meet a minimum or maximum number of keystrokes according to these guidelines, the response must be rejected.
Thus, it must not be assessed and the student has used one attempt.
The assessment must always be individual.
If a student has worked with another student, the exam paper must state who has written the individual sections and an individual assessment must be given. If it is not stated who has written the individual sections, the exam paper must be rejected because it does not fulfil the requirements for individualization in the Danish Ministerial Order on University Examinations.
A student who cannot participate in the exam must visit a doctor and obtain documentation for his or her illness. The documentation must be sent as soon as possible to Registration and Legality (the examinations office) via SPOC (See 2.6).
Sometimes, the student may also be given permission to have the submission deadline for an assignment postponed. This permission is given by the study board, and also in this case a doctor’s certificate is required.
The university instructor must not give permission for these things himself or herself.
During the exam
The examination must be organised based on the description that is in the course description and in the curriculum.
The course description can be found both in the course room in Itslearning and on the programme page on MitSDU under Udbudte kurser.
The curriculum can be found on the programme page on MitSDU under Curriculum.
It is not allowed to test according to criteria other than what is described in the curriculum/course description.
When you assess an exam, you must take the subject’s objectives as the starting point.
If marks are given according to the seven-point grading scale, you must use the Danish Ministerial Order on the Grading Scale and Other Forms of Assessment of University Education as the basis for assessing the degree to which the exam performance fulfils the objectives of the subject.
If the assessment is passed/fail, you must evaluate whether the exam performance fulfils the objectives of the subject sufficiently. In other words, you must not attempt to have a specific distribution of marks, where at the time the mark is given you compare the performance with the performance of other students, but base it on the objectives of the subject.
The assessment must always be individual. If a student has worked with another student, the exam paper must state who has written the individual sections and an individual assessment must be given. If it is not stated who has written the individual sections, the exam paper must be rejected because it does not fulfil the requirements for individualization in the Danish Ministerial Order on University Examinations.
You must take notes of the assessment and save them for at least one year. The notes must be used in case of a complaint.
If it during the assessment becomes evident, that you and the external assessor are unable to come to a united conclusion regarding the awarding of grades the regulations laid down in paragraphs 25 and 26 in the Examination Order comes into effect.
Section 25. If the examiners do not agree on the grade, they each award a grade. The grade awarded for the examination will then be the average of these grades rounded off to the nearest grade on the grading scale. If the average is half-way between two grades on the grading scale, the final grade will be the nearest higher grade if the external examiner has awarded the highest grade, or otherwise the nearest lower grade.
(2). Subclause (1) applies correspondingly if several examiners and several external examiners participate in the assessment, however, such that the group of external examiners and the group of examiners each award one grade.
Section 26. If the examiner and external examiner do not agree on whether the performance should be assessed as Pass or Fail, the external examiner's judgement is decisive.
(2). If the examiners and external examiners do not agree on whether the performance should be assessed as Pass or Fail, the assessment is passed if at least half of the examiners, including at least one external examiner, give this assessment.
See the website about how to fill out a protocol.
The exam must be carried out based on the description in the course description.
It is not allowed to carry out the exam following criteria other than those that are described in the curriculum/course description.
The course description describes the formal requirements for the exam, for example, the number of pages that the exam paper must have. The curriculum clearly states definitions for the number of keystrokes for a standard page and what should be counted.
The students must use a special front page when they submit written assignments. Here, the students must state the number of keystrokes. (See 3.1)
If an exam paper does not meet a minimum or maximum number of keystrokes according to these guidelines, the response must be rejected. Thus, it must not be assessed and the student has used one attempt.
All exam papers less than 10 MB, which are submitted via the Blackboard IT platform, will be automatically checked for plagiarism and the reports can be read there.
Ask your degree programme secretary if you have questions about the system.
If you suspect examination irregularities, you must go to your Head of Studies.
The suspicion must be justified and documented using markings in the student’s exam paper.
The Head of Studies will investigate the case and make a decision on the extent to which the student must be reported.
A response that includes cheating must not be assessed – so it is important to retain the examination result until the case has been settled. Write EU in the examination protocol.
When you have reported suspected exam irregularities, the Head of studies may decide that it was not cheating, but poor academic craftsmanship.
In such cases, the student is only given guidance, not a sanction, and his or her exam paper must be assessed.
When an exam paper contains poor academic craftsmanship, this will affect the mark according to an individual academic assessment.
After the exam
The Danish Ministerial Order on University Examinations gives students the right to complain.
Complaints may be made about an assessment, test course of events, the basis for the examination (questions, assignments etc.) and legal conditions.
If the student complains about something that the university instructor has had influence on or has the possibility to assess, you will be asked to make a statement.
If the student complains about the assessment, the university instructor must provide an explanation about how the mark was arrived at. The explanation must be based on the objectives of the subject and the Danish Ministerial Order on the Grading Scale and Other Forms of Assessment of University Education.
It is important for you to save the notes from your original assessment so you have a starting point for preparing the explanation.
If the student complains about other things, the university instructor must address the complaints that are made in the explanation.
When the statement is written on behalf of a public institution, there is an obligation to keep it in an academic and friendly tone – even if the student has been unreasonable or emotional in his or her complaint. Please, also always keep in mind not to compromise your duty of confidentiality by telling any outside party who the complainant is.
The statement will be sent to the student, who has the opportunity to send comments. If the faculty believes that the student’s comments provide new information, the faculty will then ask for further comments from the university instructor with regard to the comments received.
The faculty makes the decision
The Danish Ministerial Order on University Examinations states that the decision must be made on the basis of the student’s complaint, the professional statement of the assessors and the student’s comments on the statement. That is, the exam paper itself is not included in the basis for the faculty’s decision.
In connection with the faculty’s processing of the case, if there are any doubts that can only be settled by looking at the exam paper itself, the faculty may choose to make a decision to make a new assessment.
If the complaint is about an oral test, naturally a reassessment cannot be made, but the faculty may choose to offer a re-examination.
Statistically, approximately 25% of the complaints result in a reassessment/re-examination and the rest are not upheld. Regardless of what the decision is, it will be sent to the university instructor for information purposes. Note, however, that the decision will only be in English if the student does not understand Danish.
When processing a complaint, if the faculty discovers that errors have been made, an attempt will be made to correct the errors. This may be to offer a reassessment or a re-examination. In some cases, this will be offered to all of those who have participated in the exam with errors.
If the decision about the complaint is not in favour of the student, he or she has the right to appeal the decision within 14 days.
In this case, a board of appeal consisting of two examiners, another university instructor and a student, will look at the case again. The board of appeal reviews the same documents as the faculty; that is, the complaint, the assessors’ statement and the complainant’s comments, after which they assess whether they agree with the faculty that the decision should not be made in the complainant’s favour.
The board of appeal has the possibility to reach another decision than the faculty and offer a reassessment or a re-examination.
If the student has been offered a reassessment or a re-examination test, he or she has 14 days to accept the offer. Then new assessors are assigned to carry out the reassessment or re-examination. The new assessors get the exam paper itself, the exam assignment (if any), as well as the programme regulation’s description of the subject, but are not given access to the other documents in the case.
As a rule, the re-assessors are given one month to carry out the reassessment. The reassessment may result in a lower mark than the original one, but a higher mark may also be given. A written justification must be given for the mark, which is sent to the student.
The original assessors will be informed about the result of the reassessment.