External examiners
The external examiner role
Details of the role of an external examiner for York St John, including induction, assessment boards, and reports.
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Induction
External examiner induction materials are hosted the University's virtual learning environment, Moodle. A link to these materials will be sent with the examiner's appointment information.
External examiners with no previous experience of the role will be appointed a mentor in their first year of appointment. The role of the mentor is set out in the following document together with a report template which should be completed and submitted by the mentor:
Moodle
Moodle is the University's virtual learning environment. This is an online platform where students can find resources, prompts to self-directed learning, a week to week layout of their modules and submit their assignments.
External examiners will need to engage with Moodle as part of the assessment process. Moodle provides external examiners with the opportunity to engage directly with teaching materials and learning support.
Please refer to our Technology Enhanced Learning pages for further support and information for external examiners regarding how to access and use Moodle.
Assessment boards
School Assessment Boards
The School Assessment Boards (SABs) are responsible for the oversight of assessment for all taught provision within an academic school, including ensuring that assessment procedures are properly conducted and standards assured. The SAB has delegated authority from the University Assessment Board (UAB) to undertake the final approval of progression outcomes and the classification of awards.
External examiners are invited to all meetings of the SAB and are required to attend at least 1 meeting annually either in person or online. Subject area external examiners are not required to attend the UAB.
University Assessment Board
The University Assessment Board (UAB) has oversight of decisions taken by School Assessment Boards on the progress of students and the classification of degrees and other awards. The Regulatory External Examiner is a member of this committee and attends.
Reports
We ask all external examiners to produce a report each year, for which we provide a template. Please note that the report must be completed in one session. The questions are provided in the documents below for information prior to completing the online form:
External examiner report:
Regulatory external examiner report:
- Regulatory external examiner report form
- Regulatory External Examiner - questions for information (docx, 29KB)
External examiners are reminded that they may make separate and confidential reports to the Vice Chancellor on any matter of serious concern.
Reports are sent directly to the Registry team and are graded before being shared with academic schools. The grade reflects the seriousness of any issues raised in a report and determines the process for responding. It is essential that external examiners receive a written response to their report to outline how the programme/school/University is responding to any issues raised.
A second flag (LD) will be added to the grades of reports which are perceived to lack detail. The responsibility for following up on this with the external examiner lies with the school.
- Procedure for Reviewing External Examiner Reports (PDF, 0.1MB)
- Response to External Examiner Report (DOCx, 22.5B)
The issues, responses and analysis will be further considered in:
- The annual monitoring processes for subjects, and their reviews by the academic schools and by the joint meeting of the University Quality and Standards Committee and Education Committee.
- The External Examiner Annual Monitoring Report.
- The Annual Quality Report.
