Any university lecturers here?

CharlieRabbit01

Luckylucy wrote: »

This is from the Handbook:

Reading and resources list
Pre-requisite reading
There is no pre-requisite reading requirement.

Core text(s)
Academic and Professional Skills: Quantitative Methods (Pearson Custom Text, compiled by SD Trotter and available in bookstore on-campus). < I have this
Godwin, J. (2011) Planning your Essay, Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke.
Godfrey, J. (2011) Reading & Making Notes, Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke.
Williams, K. (2011) Getting Critical, Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke.
Williams, K. and Carroll, J. (2011) Referencing & Understanding Plagiarism, I think I need to buy this!
Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke.
Williams, K., Wooliams, M. and Spiro, J. (2012) Reflective Writing, Palgrave
Macmillan, Basingstoke.

Equivalent reading
Cameron, S. (2005) Business Students Handbook: Learning Skills for Study and
Employment, Pearson Education, London.
Lewis, M. and Reinders, H. (2003) Study Skills for Speakers of English as a Second
Language, Palgrave, Hampshire.
McMillan, K. and Weyers, J. (2006) The Smarter Student - Study Skills & Strategies
for Success at University, Pearson Education, London.
Moore, S., Neville, C., Murphy, M. and Connolly, C. (2010) The Ultimate Study
Skills Handbook, Open UP Study Skills, Open University Press, Maidenhead.
Ramsay, P., Maier, P. and Price, G. (2010) Study Skills for Business and
Management Students, Pearson Education, Harlow.


None of the text's are related to the topic we had to write the essay on, only on how to write the essay in a sense. Which obviously is related but I'm not sure if I even know what I mean!
I spent hours in the library scouring for books and journals on the topic. The library is 8 floors but only 1 or possibly 2 floors now are open, all of the books are on High Demand so you either can't remove them from the library or can only for 24 hours and cannot renew.

I know it's not relevant to my grade (just a rant really!) but the place is a complete shambles at the moment and 3 out of the 8 of my friendship group have already applied to other universities they are so fed up with how poor it's been this year!

Maybe I am too thick for university and should just quit, seems such a waste of money to just be so disheartened and frustrated but although not the brightest crayon in the box I love learning.

Dont be dishearten this is your first essay. What was the unit? It sounds like it was to check your essay writing skills.

The university library are not required to supply enough books for every student the cost and storage would be rediculous it is expected that students purchase regularly used books.

If your struggling to understand the way you uni works speak to your student union they are there to help with everything not just disputes.

Uniworker

Lieja wrote: »

OP says she referenced two books and a journal so wouldn't that count as three then?

I know it's still not five, but it's more than half!

I had the same issues with getting hold of books, the only sure way to get hold of them was to be happy to spend days sitting in the library! Do you have access to E-books?

Yep, sounds like 3 to me! Could you not reserve books/ check the catalogue beforehand to ensure what you wanted was there?

Gloomendoom

Luckylucy wrote: »

Maybe I am too thick for university and should just quit, seems such a waste of money to just be so disheartened and frustrated but although not the brightest crayon in the box I love learning.

I think you may be blowing this out of proportion! Think positively... you have learnt something.

thorsoak

Don't forget - in addition to using the college library, you can also ask your local library to obtain/reserve books for you - I found it extremely useful - and the local librarian was so thrilled to be asked to obtain books that were not on the usual run of the mill books.

Luckylucy

CharlieRabbit01 wrote: »

Dont be dishearten this is your first essay. What was the unit? It sounds like it was to check your essay writing skills.

The university library are not required to supply enough books for every student the cost and storage would be rediculous it is expected that students purchase regularly used books.

If your struggling to understand the way you uni works speak to your student union they are there to help with everything not just disputes.

Oh of course not that would be crazy! I have all of the core module books, I use Athens and Google Scholar for internet papers etc... and get what I can out of the library, or instead of taking the whole book home, photocopy the pages I want and leave the book but I reference the book on the bottom of the page. You cannot access the most of the books that they have because all the floors are closed!

So far this year the union has tried to ban Blurred Lines, The Sun and something else I can't remember off the top of my head without consultation with the student body. They aren't in many people's good books!

I am going to email my disability tutor tomorrow and speak to them (not about my grade) but I keep getting really upset about the feedback comments, which I know is daft and I'm sure it is not personal but might see if I can speak to the uni counsellor or something as I can't keep crying every time someone criticises my work! :rotfl:

This was worth 30% of my grade so I am just going to have to take it on the chin and know now for the next one!

Uniworker

Luckylucy wrote: »

Oh of course not that would be crazy! I have all of the core module books, I use Athens and Google Scholar for internet papers etc... and get what I can out of the library, or instead of taking the whole book home, photocopy the pages I want and leave the book but I reference the book on the bottom of the page. You cannot access the most of the books that they have because all the floors are closed!

So far this year the union has tried to ban Blurred Lines, The Sun and something else I can't remember off the top of my head without consultation with the student body. They aren't in many people's good books!

I am going to email my disability tutor tomorrow and speak to them (not about my grade) but I keep getting really upset about the feedback comments, which I know is daft and I'm sure it is not personal but might see if I can speak to the uni counsellor or something as I can't keep crying every time someone criticises my work! :rotfl:

This was worth 30% of my grade so I am just going to have to take it on the chin and know now for the next one!

I'm going to make an educated guess and say you're at Hull uni. If I'm right they seemingly have quite a good library website and are using the software I described earlier. Contact your faculty librarian and they will be more than happy to help.

pearl123

You state you have an exam coming up. You need to get you dyslexia needs full assessed, as you are likely to be given extra time. University essays are a learning curve. Remember to follow the essay guidance notes fully. If you miss something out that they request you will not achieve the highest marks. (I'm stating the obvious here) I'm dyslexic too and find that I need to put in long hours to just correct minor errors. Missing words etc. Make sure you get a friend to proof read.

Person_one

Luckylucy wrote: »

So far this year the union has tried to ban Blurred Lines, The Sun and something else I can't remember off the top of my head without consultation with the student body.

You say that like its a bad thing!

claire16c

Lieja wrote: »

Just an idea...

When I was at uni I looked up loads of journals online, but because they exist in print too I always referenced them as though I'd looked at the printed journal rather than the website. Might be an idea to do this in future if you don't have the required number of books to reference?

I thought that's what you were supposed to do anyway.

After all whether you get a reference from a journal ( I always used to call them references) it doesn't matter whether you read it on a computer screen or a piece of paper.

Our uni gave us passwords to some online journal websites not that I can remember the name of them now!

All we would have been doing otherwise was just listing that website over and over which had access to thousands of topics.

valk_scot

Luckylucy wrote: »

"You clearly violate the assignment requirement for at least five non-web references. You supply only two. You either have not read the requirement carefully, or decided not to follow the rules."


I did in fact read the assignment requirement carefully and the Module handbook which state about the assignment:

'should be appropriately referenced using ACADEMIC sources of literature (books and journals)' (Module Handbook)

and

'Your assignment must have at least five (5) academic references from books or journals. Any use of websites (including the reference for your chosen video) is additional to the five required references and all references must use Harvard referencing style as illustrated in your HUBS Study Skills Handbook.' (Assignment Brief)

Within my assignment there is at least 5 references to books or journals using the Harvard referencing style and both books are listed in my reference list.

No where in the brief or module handbook is there a mention of there needing to be five individual academic texts in the reference list specifically, just that they need to be referenced.

Even in the study skills handbook there is no (can't think of the word) clarification between referencing in text and a reference list.

From the feedback I am guessing that the lecturer wanted 5 separate sources in the reference list not 5 references from books or journals in the text.

In one book I used 3 references and 1 books I used 2 references as well as an online journal and some webpages.

It was only a 1000 essay!!

I'm first year so although it doesn't go towards my classification it count towards getting a placement for industrial year.

I asked my OH about this as he's a lecturer. He says yes, the bolded text means five separate sources, not multiple quotes from the same two sources. He does comment that this could be made clearer but that in first year at university it's better to go for either overkill or clarification if you're not sure what the assignment requires. And that it's better to learn this in your first term than when you submit something that counts towards your degree classification. A lot of first term work is designed to hone up your writing and research skills rather than learning the subject content after all and it could be argued that you've definitely learned something really useful here.


There should be "learning to Learn" and "Learning to Write" modules available for first year students in most unis, either face to face or on line. Learning how to present your work is one of the hardest things for new students, it's a big jump between school and uni in this respect. But you will lose marks hand over fist if you don't learn how to answer the question in the format required when submitting work, OH says that at least half his students regularly lose marks over this sort of thing and in quite significant amounts, and that's including the post-grads too. He says if in doubt, ASK, do not assume, your lecturer might privately think you're a numpty but that's better than being an even bigger numpty by not asking, putting in a sub standard bit of work and losing significant marks for something important.


And get your dyslexia assessment on your course leader's desk asap, they can't give you any extra allowances/extensions until they know about it. Once they've got it though there's a lot of additional help available so never be afraid to ask. They don't actually want you to fail, it reflects badly on them too! My OH is a famously grumpy git but he'll go miles out his way for a student that has a genuine problem...but he can't do this if he doesn't know there is a problem, you know?