New Information Pack for Period 31&32 – Key Additional Requirements – IMPORTANT

Information Pack for submission period P31 and P32 has been released and there are not such major changes except few additional requirements and provide clarity on some important aspects of Research and Analysis Project (RAP)

Student must adhere all additional requirements and get clarity on important aspects for any subsequent submission of RAP to Oxford Brookes University (OBU).

Here is a brief summary of additional requirements / changes mentioned in latest Information Pack 2015-16.

a. Oral Examination of sample of students (section 5.a, pg. 12)
b. Clarity on role of Project Mentor (section 6.a, pg. 18)
c. Changes in requirements for Skills and Learning Statement – SLS (section 6.d, pg. 23) – Applicable from Period 32
d. Topic 8 and 15 new requirements (section 7.b, pg. 27-28)- Applicable from Period 32
e. Requirement of copy of the letter of authorization in case of usage of primary source of information (section 7.d.iii.e, pg. 36)
f. Online Plagiarism Test (section 7.d.v. pg. 42-44)
g. Procedure for investigation and possible outcomes of guilty of academic misconduct

Detail of all above mentioned aspect are as follows:

a. ORAL EXAMINATION OF SAMPLE OF STUDENTS

A sample of students will be given a viva, which is an oral examination. The sample will be selected randomly after students have submitted their RAPs. If you are selected for a viva you will be contacted by Oxford Brookes ACCA office to organise the timing and location. The viva may be undertaken face to face or by other medium such as Skype, it would be expected to last around 15 minutes and students could be asked about any aspect of their submission. The viva is used for the rpurpose of verification that the work is your own.

b. CLARITY ON ROLE OF PROJECT MENTOR

Your Project Mentor does not play any part in the assessment of your RAP beyond the certification provided to Oxford Brookes University.

c. CHANGES IN REQUIREMENTS FOR SKILLS AND LEARNING STATEMENT

From Period 32 May 2016 submission rather than answering four questions you will be required to write a 2000 word critical reflection ‘what you have learned from undertaking the Research and Analysis Project’ supported by personal examples.

d. TOPIC 8 AND 15 NEW REQUIREMENTS

For topics 8 and 15 from May 2016 there will be a requirement for all students to use sector specific organisations, based on the Industry Classification Benchmark (ICB), the industry sectors for which will be provided by Oxford Brookes each year on the 1st December for the next two submission periods with changes to the industry sector each year. Therefore on 1st December Oxford Brookes will release 3 sectors which students will be required to choose their organisations from for the May 2016 (Period 32) and November 2016 (Period 33). These will be released onto the ACCA website BSc Applied Accounting under the ‘Rap Submission’ section. Sectors for future periods will be released on 1st December each year.

e. REQUIREMENT OF COPY OF THE LETTER OF AUTHORIZATION IN CASE OF USAGE OF PRIMARY SOURCE OF INFORMATION

You are required to include a copy of the letter of authorisation and approval to undertake the primary research from the senior person in the organisation as an appendix to your submission

f. ONLINE PLAGIARISM TEST

Mary Davis from Oxford Brookes international has created an on-line plagiarism test which you can use to see how well you understand about referencing and plagiarism before you tick the box to say that the work is your own and therefore not plagiarised.
Available at https://cw.routledge.com/textbooks/bailey/questions.asp?unit=1

g. PROCEDURE OF INVESTIGATION AND POSSIBLE OUTCOMES OF GUILTY OF ACADEMIC MISCONDUCT

Where Oxford Brookes has concerns over a students’ academic conduct they will be referred to the Academic Conduct Officer (ACO) who will investigate the case. The ACO will assess the extent to which the Oxford Brookes University regulations have been breached.

Step 1:

When the results are released to the Submission Website, a student whose work is referred to the ACO will see a standard letter giving the deferred status of their project. This letter states that the student’s mark has been deferred and their work has been sent to an ACO, and it outlines the generalised basic reasons for such action. It also gives an initial timeframe for action and response.

Step 2:

The student receives a standard e-mail from an Academic Conduct Officer (within 1 month of results release) – stating that the normal procedure would be face-to-face interview, but as this is not practical, the options for the student are:

? E-mail response from student
? Telephone Conference call
? Video/Skype Conference

This initial e-mail explains the reasons for their work’s referral to an Academic Conduct Officer – with documentation attached – and gives a timescale for further action.

Step 3:

An interview is conducted with the Academic Conduct Officer by e-mail, telephone conference call or video conference. The student is given an opportunity to present evidence in defence.

Step 4:

ACO may then:

Decide there is no case to answer and refer the case back to the BSc Applied Accounting Programme Lead who will then reinstate the original grade

Or

Decide on behalf of OBU that the student has breached the University’s academic conduct regulations and apply one of the following penalties:

1. Academic Negligence

The extent of the breach is small and there are good reasons to believe it was due to ignorance or carelessness rather than deliberate deception. Not necessary to award a fail grade; however, the ACO has the power to judge whether the student has passed specific assessment criteria, in particular ‘information gathering and referencing’.

The ACO has the power to judge whether the student has passed specific assessment criteria, in particular ‘Information Gathering and Referencing’. While not specifically a penalty, a Fail grade in this criterion may be judged appropriate.

Where students are eligible to re-submit the project the submission will be for the next submission period and the student can resubmit the same project corrected.

2. Malpractice

Either

The extent of the breach is small, but it is not reasonable for the student to display such a level of ignorance or carelessness; or

The extent of the breach is small but the student admits that their work was in breach of the regulations; or

The grounds for believing that the breach arose from ignorance are those for ‘academic negligence’ but the extent of the breach is too great to regard it as such.

Because the extent of the breach in this category is large, the project will necessarily be failed in the criterion of ‘Information Gathering and Referencing’.

The student can resubmit a NEW project on the same or different topics

3. Misconduct

Either

Where the extent of the breach is that for ‘academic malpractice’ (or even ‘academic negligence’) but the student has already committed an offence of ‘academic malpractice’ of a similar kind or ‘academic misconduct’ of any kind;

or

Where the scale of the breach is so great that no reasonable person should have concluded that it was reasonable academic behaviour; or

Where the student admits or, on the balance of probability, the ACO determines that the student set out to gain an unfair advantage by their behaviour.

Award a mark of zero for the project.

The student may be permitted to resubmit a NEW project on a NEW topic and different organization;

Advise ACCA who will issue a cautionary email.

4. Referral to the University Misconduct Committee

A particularly serious first offence, a deliberate breach which is a second offence, should normally be referred to the University Misconduct Committee (UMC) for a more severe penalty. In addition, any case where there is evidence of an intention to cheat and the student was likely to have failed the RAP if they had not done so should normally be referred to the University Misconduct Committee.

Examples of such serious breaches include evidence of systematic working with others (organised group collusion) and or obtaining a project from a mentor or tutor, or buying in a project. The UMC may:

? Decide no disciplinary action is necessary
? Fail the student but allow to resubmit a NEW project on a NEW topics
? Give the student a written warning
? Expel the student from the Programme/University

The Faculty of Business will forward all confirmed cases to the ACCA with all relevant evidence for possible disciplinary action by the ACCA. Where a student is, as a result, excluded by ACCA it is for a maximum of 5 years, after which they are entitled to apply for readmission to ACCA.

The full range of penalties that can be imposed by ACCA’s Disciplinary Committee are listed in the Rule Book

https://www.accaglobal.com/content/dam/ACCA_Global/Students/rulebook/acca_2014_rulebook.pdf.

These are provided on page 229 under the heading ‘Orders and Sanctions’.

Useful Links:

https://business.brookes.ac.uk/undergraduate/2016/acca/files/information-pack.pdf

https://business.brookes.ac.uk/undergraduate/2016/acca/files/re-submission-guide-2015-16.pdf

https://business.brookes.ac.uk/undergraduate/2016/acca/files/student-letters.pdf

Note: All detail provided above extracted from Information Pack 2015-16.