Examinations

For undergraduates, there are two examination periods, with the main exams being held in June and resit exams held in September. Students on the Maths and Philosophy course will normally also have some Maths exams in the January exam period. The main summer examination period in the Summer Term runs from Monday Week 4 to Saturday of Week 9. In the 2025-26 academic year that is Monday 18th May - Saturday 27th June.

Further details regarding the release of the Exams Timetable can be gained from the Exams Office Website. Please note that undergraduate examinations are scheduled centrally by the Examinations Office. The Philosophy Department does not control on which exams are held on which day.

All students must ensure they are available for the full length of exam periods.

Examination Answers

The Philosophy Department runs some examinations online and some in-person.

For in-person exams, please ensure that you write clearly in the examination. If the examiners cannot read your script easily they may require you to come into the Department and type what you have written. For this reason it is very important to keep an eye on your emails during term time even after you have completed all of your examinations and essays. Please also read the rubric carefully to check how many questions you should answer and from which sections of the paper.

Further information about Philosophy examinations is available here.

Attendance

It is your responsibility to present yourself at the correct time and place for your examinations. Failure to attend through mis-registration, misreading of the timetable, oversleeping, transport delays, or any similar cause, will not be condoned by the Board of Examiners; Regulation 10.2 (3) states that in such circumstances the examination is failed. Further information about what to do if you miss an exam can be found here.

Regulation 10.2 (1) states that normally a candidate who arrives within 30 minutes of the start of the examination (or even later if no candidate has already left) will be permitted to enter the examination room. If you are excluded from an examination, report immediately to the Student Enquiry Desk of the Academic Office in University House.

For online examinations, if you start your exam after the start time (usually 9.30am or 2pm) you will be deemed to have started late and will not have the full time to complete your assessment. You must also ensure you have uploaded your assessment, completed the cover sheet and submitted your answers before the upload window ends. The Philosophy Office cannot accept late submissions by email under any circumstances.

If one of the University Wellbeing Services have recommended that you sit your exams somewhere other than the main hall, your exam may start 30 minutes earlier than for others on your course. Please check your personal exams timetable carefully for the room and the start time. If your exams are scheduled in the Philosophy Department, you will receive a memo outlining your particular arrangements early in term 3. For online exams, students with additional time will have this automatically added to their end time.

Special Arrangements for Exams

If you have a disability, learning difficulty, temporary disability, illness or other medical condition that could affect your ability to take examinations, special exam arrangements can be made through Disability Services. These arrangements may include, for example, extra time for dyslexic students, the use of a PC or amanuensis where the ability to write is seriously impaired, individual invigilation to allow for rest breaks or permission to take a bag, phone or other item as agreed in advance in the exam. In all cases you will need to submit medical evidence to support your request.

Please note that except for circumstances in which a disability could not be anticipated, there are deadlines set by the Exams Office each academic year for special examination arrangements and there is no guarantee that any requests after these deadlines will be accommodated by the Exam Office or your Department. A deadline will operate for notification of requests for special arrangements to your personal tutor and to Disability Services. The deadlines for 2025-26 can be found here.

Use of Bilingual Dictionaries

Students whose first language is not English are permitted to use a bilingual dictionary during most University examinations. If you wish to apply for this, please contact the Philosophy Programmes Team in good time before your examinations. Someone from the Department will need to check your entitlement and stamp the dictionary (which you supply yourself) to certify it as suitable and without annotations. Dictionaries are also liable to be checked by any member of staff during or after an examination period. Use of an uncertified dictionary is regarded as cheating, and the appropriate penalties may be applied. If there are examinations in which no bilingual dictionaries are permitted notices will be posted by the University before the start of the main Summer examination period.