Criteria for appointment

Course teams, SASQC (or VSSC) and the External Examiner Appointments Panel will be guided by the following criteria when considering external examiner nominations.

• An external's academic and/or professional qualifications, standing, expertise and experience should be appropriate to the programme in terms of both level and subject.
• An external should have sufficient recent external examining or comparable related experience to indicate competence in assessing students in the subject. An external may be appointed with no previous external examiner experience provided they have sufficient internal examining experience or other relevant and recent experience or training. Where possible, the examiner should join an experienced team or work initially alongside the current external and be subject to other induction arrangements. The nomination form should include an appropriate supporting statement.
• The appointment should secure an appropriately balanced team that is able to cover the academic and professional subject content. The Dean/Head of the Validated Centre has a duty to ensure that the appropriate number of externals is appointed to ensure adequate expertise is available to cover the major areas of the course and cope with the volume of student work.

Restrictions on appointment

The following restrictions on appointments apply.

1. An external must not be over-extended by the duties. S/he should not concurrently hold more than the equivalent of two substantial external examiner appointments. (If the external appears to exceed this norm, the course team should provide supporting arguments, for example that the phasing of assessments alleviates the workload during an academic session).
2. An external is expected to be impartial in judgement and should not have any direct current ties with the university or its staff, or have had any in the last three years or 5 years in the exceptional case of examiners being re-appointed.  This applies also to external examiners for Validated Centre Collaborative Provision.
3. An external should not have acted as a consultant to a course team within the last three years. Prior to their appointment an external may have been a member of a panel established to approve the course, however following their appointment they may not be a member of a panel established to review the course.  An examiner should not have done any paid work within the School within the last three years.
4. No external examiner may be appointed if by doing so a reciprocal arrangement for external examining would arise.
5. An external should not normally be replaced by an individual from the same institution.
6. Except in very large examining teams, there should be no more than one external from the same institution.
7. An external should not be in a position to influence the future of students on the course.
8. An external must be fluent in English, and any other appropriate language.
9. An external must not be an employee, or board member of the University or any Collaborative Partner.
10. An external must not be a recent former employee or student of the University.

Exceptions to this policy will only be approved where there are compelling reasons set out on the nomination form.