By Megan Mclean, Fourth Year, English
As the days draw in darker and the mornings are crisper than ever it can only mean one thing: the dreaded exam season is coming closer. Has the university perfected the formatting of the schedule? Or is it still leaving much to be desired?
On the 5th of February 2024, the University of Bristol announced they were changing the academic year structure to lengthen the term and place all assessments before the winter break. Their reasons for doing so were due to concerns of students and staff feeling 'overloaded' and this was their attempt at streamlining the assessment process. But has this had the intended effect? Speaking to students, it unsurprisingly varies massively from course to course. For the sake of brevity, I will categorise subjects by either mostly exam-based or mostly essay-based. While all students prefer being able to take a long rest over winter break. Whether to pick up part-time work to fund their studies (we all know Bristol's not cheap) or simply to spend quality time with family and friends at home, the break is 'needed rest' from feeling burnt out after an intensive deadline season.
Essay-heavy subjects now often have anywhere from three to six deadlines within a three-week period or even shorter. This causes an accumulation of stress and heightens burnout in a lot of students, as instead of feeling like they can reward themselves after completing an assessment; they move straight on to the next one. When winter break finally comes, they are able to take a much needed break but feel exhausted after the grind of the past month.
Sean Lawrenson
Many final year students find the pressure of this insurmountable, frustrated they can't produce their best work under these circumstances. Tutors often encourage starting assignments at least a week in advance, so that you can spend a couple days before the deadline editing. With this model, it can sometimes mean the writing process needs to be compressed into far shorter amounts of time to meet back-to-back deadlines. Still, being a fairly new idea, there isn't any proof into whether it is negatively impacting students' grades.
'As a whole, exam-based subjects seem to have benefitted more from this change'
It is also inherently built into the structure that content studied later in the term get looked over by students, when their focus goes to the upcoming assessments rather than delving into new readings and ideas. Some students find this frustrating, as topics they would have preferred to write their essays on don't occur in the curriculum until later, making the usefulness of the teaching void. Tutors normally notice a drop in attendance around the due dates as well, which can be discouraging when they devote time to planning and finding resources for these lessons.
Exam-based subjects are enjoying the new structure a bit more, where before they felt it impossible to rest over the winter break they can actually take the time to step back from their studies a little bit more. In previous years, the winter break was a vigorous time for students. Instead of being able to enjoy the festivities they felt a push to study and revise content, so that they didn't forget it over the gap in teaching. A certain amount of guilt came about with relaxing so, in this way, the change is a fantastic thing, encouraging students to take a break and promoting the productivity of doing so.
Orla Ruane
The biggest factor is whether the individual courses have factored this into how they structure their delivery of content. Some students are wrapping up teaching as early as week eight, whereas some are still having to attend lectures up until consolidation week. Even on the same course, students are finding there is a disparity in their teaching, as due to different pathways and modules being taken in later years, some have more time to revise their content than others. Talking to their peers can make them feel disheartened. Some have far more time to prepare than others.
As a whole, exam-based subjects seem to have benefitted more from this change. Obviously, this does not speak to everyone's experience and I have made a few generalisations in this article. I feel the premise of the change was well-meaning, but, ultimately, the exam schedule could benefit from some fine-tuning to make sure everyone across the university feels supported in their mental wellbeing during this time.
Featured image: Epigram / Lindsay Shimizu
Do you prefer exams before or after the break? And more importantly, good luck on your assessments!
