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My degree has inflicted an unfair module

Hi all, prepare for a long story!

I am studying town planning (5 year course) in a university based in the north of England. I started on this course in 2013 and am due to finish summer of 2018.

A module has been started this year for our final year (as in we are the first set of students on this degree programme to ever do this module). It is a civil engineering module on surveying and is highly mathematical.

When I applied to the course way back in 2013 there was no suggestion that this module was on the course.

To do civil engineering at this uni you have to have done A-level maths, something that I and nobody on my town planning degree has done. Due to the mathematical nature of the degree we are all now struggling on this module and we have an exam in a few days time on it. Many of us feel this is the difference between passing and failing the entire degree.

My question/point is that is this fair? Personally I don't think it is fair that the uni has put us on a module which we are all unqualified for, during the middle of the degree and the fact that when we applied for the degree there was no advertisement of this module (they advertised every other module). Had I known this module was on it I would have been less willing to do the course.

Reply 1

username1333513

it doesn’t sound fair, my course is heavily mathematical and a lot of people on my course had done a level maths, but during my first year the course still had a module on basic a level maths to help students who didn’t do maths a level. I’m not sure what can be done though

Reply 2

Travisty

I think this is something you should have brought up with the university or module convener. I imagine you've had a few months of this module, countless time to learn the mathematics? It may be a module with specific maths that doesn't require knowing all A Level maths.

I didn't study A-level maths and my first year on a computing degree had me in the library learning some for one module.

Reply 3

Freedommm

At university you are expected to be responsible for your own learning. If there are gaps in your education take time to fill them. That is what the best students do.

Reply 4

Kevin De Bruyne

The only thing I would say that is this really going to be the difference between passing and failing?

I know it's unhelpful to have a bad unit but with averages, it's not the end of the world. It could also be that the marks from the exam are scaled if everyone finds it very difficult.

Reply 5

jjh87

Original post by Kevin De Bruyne

The only thing I would say that is this really going to be the difference between passing and failing?.

Yes it will be. If we fail any module then we do not get the degree.

Reply 6

jjh87

Original post by Freedommm

At university you are expected to be responsible for your own learning. If there are gaps in your education take time to fill them. That is what the best students do.

I have been doing this though. I have still not understood anything about the module. It is completely incomprehensible to me after months of trying.

Reply 7

Travisty

Original post by jjh87

Yes it will be. If we fail any module then we do not get the degree.

I've never known a university to do that. I'm skeptical if that's true or not.

Reply 8

doodle_333

Just because you need A level Maths to do civil engineering doesn't mean you need A level Maths to do this module. Speak to your lecturers about the module but I'm guessing nothing will change so invest your energy somewhere useful and try and learn the maths.

Reply 9

jjh87

Original post by Travisty

We have spoken collectively with the course director and she's just said they have tried this as a test for this year. I don't think it is acceptable to use my £9k year education for their own testing purposes when it risks us failing. We literally turned up in induction week in September and we just given this.

Reply 10

Exceptional

How was the module taught? For instance, did they teach you how to work out certain problems using relevant maths?

For a module of people with no relevant training, I can't imagine you being told something like "just take the partial derivative and interpret X" without being taught how to do partial derivatives. If it was completely unexplained, it would be unreasonable and I feel like you'd have complained months ago. If, on the other hand, you've been taught how to do the maths, but it's a bit of a stretch, that sounds reasonable enough to me.

Reply 11

username1230881

Original post by Travisty

I've never known a university to do that. I'm skeptical if that's true or not.

Surely that's normal for most degrees? To get an honours degree you need 360 credits, 120 from each year, for example. So if you fail a module, whether it's 5 or 30 credits, you won't get any of the credits for it, so you won't reach 120 from that year and 360 overall, so you wouldn't get an honours degree. Same applies for four year or five year degrees, just with more credits.

Reply 12

jjh87

Original post by Exceptional

The module is taught through lectures and practicals. I have scored well on the practicals (group work) but this makes up only 15% of the module and the rest is the exam.

In each lecture there are 200 students. However only 20 of them (including me) are from my degree programme where maths A-level is not required. The remaining students are all civil engineering where you need an A in A-level maths to get onto that degree programme.

What I'm getting at is that the lecturer is assuming all 200 students know the rules that they are applying so he does minimal explanation. I have tried to learn it and follow outside of lectures as well but it is quite hard. Furthermore this module is the smallest credit module out of all my modules yet I am giving more out of lecture/seminar time than my higher credit modules.

Reply 13

ThePricklyOne

Original post by jjh87

Unfortunately unis are allowed to 'refresh' their courses and modules within a course from time to time.

2 of my modules were changed to double modules with longer time spent in class - usually a great idea but not if you have a job as well. Some modules have an increased math component and this has thrown a few people. Other modules have swapped the software /app required to be used in the exam /assignment and students have struggled to use the new one.

You should speak to your course lead, personal tutor, or SU as soon as possible if you think you are likely to have difficulties doing this new module. Unis are usually keen to make sure students don't fail on courses (looks bad on their rep), so they might be a bit more helpful. Perhaps the uni could arrange extra Maths support for you and other students on the course without the A Level Maths. But do this as soon as possible before the exams/assignment hand-in deadlines come round.