Costing study of two-year accelerated honours degrees

Report to HEFCE by Liz Hart Associates. "[This] study had two key objectives: to provide evidence of the impact of two-year accelerated honours degrees on course costs; to make comparisons with the costs of comparable degrees delivered through the traditional three-year route; and, in addition, the study was to consider any barriers to the possibility of expansion of two-year accelerated honours degrees... The indicative cost comparisons and institutional modelling in this study clearly show the potential for cost savings represented by two-year accelerated honours degrees. However, the realisation of these savings presents further challenges for institutions and the study makes recommendations to HEFCE as to how some of these might be addressed." - pp 3-4

Tracking career destinations of sports graduates 2000-2015:a longitudinal exploration of destinations and preparedness for the workplace

The advent of the TEF means that universities will be expected to evidence the impact of curriculum interactions on graduate destinations and social mobility. Over a third of sport employees are graduates but little data charts their career journeys. Key objectives: • track all Abertay sport graduates from the programmes’ inception • compare Honours and non-Honours graduates’ destination data • examine career trajectories • explore preparedness for the workplace • utilise demographic data to contextualise findings. 452 graduates were e-mailed.123 responded to the survey, 84% being in identifiable graduate level jobs. Across time, increasing proportions of students were Honours' graduates. Social class, gender and disability did not impact on this but articulation from FE was a significant factor (χ2 =84.68, p<0.01). Very few respondents (n=13) felt that their degree had not equipped them for working life. 'Placement' and 'research methods skills' were of most benefit in preparing for the workplace

Leo Major, DCM and Bar

Of all the British gallantry decorations, the Distinguished Conduct Medal must be considered the most prized because it is so seldom awarded. In the Korean War, only eight such awards were made out of a total of 205 honours and awards to Canadian soldiers.1 In the Second World War, the DCM was even more rare, making up only three per cent of all honours and awards. Thus, the award of the DCM and bar, spanning both wars, to Léo Major is a remarkable accomplishment

SPARKPLUS for Self- and Peer Assessment on Group-Based Honours’ Research Projects

This paper explores an application of an online tool SPARKPLUS (Self and Peer Assessment Resource Kit) for the self and peer assessment on the group-based Honours’ research projects. The Honours’ research projects in School of Civil, Environmental Engineering at University of Adelaide are running in a small group of students (typically four students or less) working with an academic supervisor in a selected area for one year. Since the research project is self-directed study, it is very difficult to fairly assess the contribution of individual students to the group-based research project. The paper-based method of self and peer assessment for the Honour’s research projects was used in the previous years. The same mark was often distributed and no feedback was given. Both the students and academic staff were not satisfied with the paper-based method of self and peer assessment. Thus an online tool SPARK PLUS together with a set of assessment criteria was used for the self and peer assessment of the Honours’ research projects in 2010. Thirty-seven groups participated in the self and peer assessment of using SPARK PLUS in semester one 2010 and a series of results from the online self and peer assessment were obtained and analysed. Feedback sessions were held and substantial feedback was received from students. Based on the feedback, suggestions were made on improving use of the online tool for self and peer assessment on the Honours’ research project.Chengqing Wu, Emmanuel Chanda and John Willisonhttp://www.adelaide.edu.au/erg

An exploratory study of final grades awarded to bachelor with honours and masters students : a thesis presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in Psychology at Massey University

This study explores the final grades awarded to Bachelor with honours and Masters students in New Zealand universities from 1960 to 1989 as a function of students' gender, the university attended, the degree completed, and the subject studied. These grades were also compared with the grades awarded to Bachelor with honours students in England and Wales from 1974 to 1989. Chi-square test statistics were used to measure the significance of these relationships. In New Zealand women were awarded significantly more first class degrees than men. In England and Wales men were awarded significantly more first class degrees than women. Science students were awarded a higher percentage of first class degrees than other students in both New Zealand and England and Wales. In New Zealand Bachelor with honours students were awarded first class degrees more frequently than Masters students. Political and historical developments, the nature of the grading procedures used, and institutional and departmental variance provide partial explanation for some of the results. It is clear that no single factor is responsible for these variations in degree performance, but rather a complex interaction of several factors. It is concluded that in New Zealand and England and Wales, gender, university, the degree undertaken, and the subject studied, all have an effect on the final grade a student is awarded

Educational advantage and employability of UK university graduates

In the UK, the majority of university students specialise and study just one subject at bachelor degree level, commonly known in the UK as a single honours degree. However, nearly all British universities will permit students if they wish to study two or even three subjects, so-called joint or combined honours degrees, internationally known as a double major. The purpose of this paper is to explore whether educational advantage, measured by the “Participation of Local Areas” (POLAR) classification, correlated with rates of graduate destinations for joint and single honours graduates. This study focused particularly on Russell Group and Post-92 Universities. The authors analysed the complete data set provided from the Higher Education Statistics Agency Destination of Leavers from the Higher Education survey, and combined this with data from the POLAR4 quintiles, which aggregate geographical regions across the UK based on the proportion of its young people that participate in higher education. The data were analysed to establish whether there was a difference in the highly skilled graduate employability of the joint honours students, focusing particularly on Russell Group and Post-92 Universities, in order to build on previous published work. Single honours and joint honours graduates from higher participation POLAR4 quintiles were more likely to be in a highly skilled destination. However at both the Russell Group and the Post-92 universities, respectively, there was no trend towards a smaller highly skilled destinations gap between the honours types for the higher quintiles. For the highest POLAR4 quintile, the proportion of joint honours graduates was substantially higher at the Russell Group than at Post-92 universities. Furthermore, in any quintile, there were proportionately more joint honours graduates from the Russell Group, compared with single honours graduates, and increasingly so the higher the quintile. This study focused on joint honours degrees in the UK where the two or three principal subjects fall into different Joint Academic Coding System (JACS) subject areas, i.e. the two or three subjects are necessarily diverse rather than academically cognate. This excluded the class of joint honours degrees where the principal subjects lie within the same JACS subject area, i.e. they may be closer academically, although still taught by different academic teams. However, the overall proportion of joint honours graduates identified using the classification was in line with the UCAS (2017) data on national rates of combined studies acceptances. All Russell Group graduates, irrespective of their POLAR4 quintile, were far more likely to be in a highly skilled destination than single or joint honours graduates of Post-92 universities. Even the lowest quintile graduates of the Russell Group had greater rates of highly skilled destination than the highest quintile from Post-92 universities, for both single and joint honours graduates. This demonstrated the positive impact that graduating from the Russell Group confers on both single and joint honours graduates. This study could not explain the much smaller gap in the highly skilled destinations between single honours and joint honours graduates found in the Russell Group, compared with the Post-92. Why do a higher proportion of joint honours graduates hail form the upper POLAR4 quintiles, the Russell Group joint honours graduates were more disproportionately from the upper POLAR4 quintiles and the joint honours upper POLAR4 quintiles represented such a larger proportion of the Russell Group overall undergraduate population? Other student characteristics such as tariff on entry, subjects studied, gender, age and ethnicity might all contribute to this finding. This study demonstrated that, averaged across all universities in the UK, there was a trend for both single honours and joint honours graduates from higher participation POLAR4 quintiles to be more likely to be in a highly skilled destination, i.e. the more educationally advantaged, were more likely to be in a highly skilled destination, as a proportion of the total from each honours type. This accorded with HESA (2018b) data, but expanded those findings to include direct consideration of joint honours graduates.N/