BSc (Hons) Degree in Computing -BCOL

University of Portsmouth - UK

(Direct Entry onto Final Year of Study)

1. Tell me more about University of Portsmouth.

The city of Portsmouth has been a home of higher education since the Portsmouth and Gosport School of Science and Arts was opened in 1869. Since then the institution has grown, linking with other educational establishments and changing its name; it was inaugurated on July 7, 1992 and is now known as the University of Portsmouth.

The University of Portsmouth is now one of the largest universities in England with over 17,000 students offering a wide range of opportunities to its students. We are a modern university with a large portfolio of courses with both academic and vocational emphasis, some of the best student support facilities in the UK.

The university has gained excellent results in recent independent inspections of our teaching and our students consistently achieve employability rates above the national average.

2. Tell me more about University of Portsmouth's Faculty of Technology.

The Faculty of Technology has a well-deserved reputation for excellence in teaching and research. Offering a wide range of opportunities from pre-degree to postgraduate level study, the faculty offers courses in the areas of electronic and electrical engineering, mechanical engineering, mathematics, entertainment technology, new media technology, computer science and information systems.

The faculty is actively involved in research and is at the forefront of national and international research projects in robotics, cosmology and telecommunications. The faculty's Regional Centre for Manufacturing Industry is a focal point for research and development in the South of England.

The Faculty of Technology has well-established links with industry, and many of its research groups collaborate with industrial partners and provide research to industry.

3. What is so unique about this course?

• The course conducted via Cybercampus is the same degree conferred in Portsmouth on-campus.
• University of Portsmouth is a well-known and prestigious university in UK.
• The programme structure is flexible and independent.
• It offers a fast completion time - 1 Year.
• It's the best selling program since Cybercampus started in 1999.
• The course is mentored by experienced Facilitators and shadowed Facilitation (Unit Coordinators) from UOP Faculty directly.
• The Course Contents are frequently updated to align with the latest technology to ensure students are in-line with the industry standard and trends, making them more acceptable and challenging in the consumer market.
• It's a matured program with many entry points and many options on PIP available.
• Since Day 1, Cybercampus have approximately 2,000 students in total. So far, close to 30 1st Class Honors graduates have graduated from the course.

4. What is the course about?

The BSc (Hons) in Computing awarded by the University of Portsmouth is a generic IT degree course for candidates interested in the area of database, networking, e-commerce and systems development.

This programme imparts knowledge of the technologies and methods relevant for creating and maintaining computing systems that support business data handling requirements of organizations. It deals with the creation of effective information technology systems such as solutions to business problems, as well as the management of such systems.

5. Who are the Facilitators in the course?

Please click here for more information.

6. What are the Course Fees?

Please click here for Course Fees information.

7. What are the required qualifications in order to join the course?

Please click here for the Entry Requirements.

8. Will working experience be taken into consideration?

Yes.

9. Is the e-learning platform going to be BLUEFIN or is it another platform?

Yes, student will interact with Facilitators and peers via the e-learning platform.

10. How long is 1 module conducted?

Each module is conducted over a period of 7 weeks except for PJ330 Project.

11. Is there a Project module? How long is the Project?

Yes, there is a Project module in the course. The Project is conducted over a period of 6 months.

12. What is the book list of the programme?

Student will be provided with a recommended textbook upon registration. Student will receive the textbook 7 days* before the Start of Course (SOC).

* Conditions apply.

13. What are the Academic Regulations?

The Academic Regulations are the set of rules that are used by the University to process the marks that you obtain from your coursework and your examinations and to build those marks towards an overall degree result. They also contain details of what happens when you don't manage to pass a unit and how you can make up for that failure.

14. Why should I be interested in the Academic Regulations?

From the moment you embark on the course, you should know about the Academic Regulations. The reason for this is that from the time you take your first unit the results that you get and the decisions taken about you at the various examining boards, will influence your final result. It is important, therefore, that you know what are you rights and responsibilities under these regulations.

15. What are Examining Boards?

The University has two different kinds of examining boards. One is called a Unit Assessment Board (UAB) and the other a Board of Examiners (BoE).

16. What is a Unit Assessment Board (UAB)?

The Unit Assessment Board meets once you have completed a unit of study, for example IT355, on the course. It will look at the marks that you were awarded for your coursework, the marks you gained from your examinations and the overall mark that these give you for the unit. It will look at the coursework and examination assessments themselves, comparing them with those set in the past and makes sure that the marks that are awarded are fair.

Provided your overall mark for the unit as a whole is 40% or more you will have passed that unit. The Unit Assessment Board will then award you the credit for that unit. The marks that you gained for the unit will be used when calculating your final class of degree.

17. What is Credit Point?

Every unit on your course has a tariff of so many credit points. Most of them are worth 20 credit points. Two of them, IT355 and IT356, are only worth 10 credit points. In order to be eligible for an honours degree you must have acquired 120 credit points from the units that you have studied.

18. What are Learning Objectives?

Every unit has a set of learning objectives. These are things that the student should be able to do after successfully studying the unit. In order to find out what the learning objectives are for any particular unit, all you need to do is to look at the Unit's description.

19. What happens if I don't pass a unit?

If, at your first attempt at a unit, you do not get an overall mark of 40%, then you will not have passed the unit. The Unit Assessment Board that looks at your results will then make one of a number of decisions concerning your case. If this is the first time that you have taken the unit the most likely decision is that you will be given a Referral (in a University of Portsmouth terminology this is now called a Limited Repeat Assessment or LRA for short).

An alternative decision that the UAB may take would be to ask you to retake the unit, this is often called Re-Unit (or in University of Portsmouth terms, undertake Repeat Assessment).

20. What is a Referral or Limited Repeat Assessment (LRA)?

A Referral or LRA occurs when you have failed to meet the learning outcomes of a unit that you have studied. The Unit Assessment Board will specify a piece of work or pieces of work that you must undertake in order to pass the unit, that is to meet the learning outcomes. The most common cases are where the coursework and examination for a unit are assessing different learning outcomes and you have, for example, not passed the coursework, then you will be asked to do another coursework. Similarly, if you have not passed the examination you will have been asked to take another examination.

Should you have failed both the coursework and the examination components of a unit you could be referred in both of these, which is have to take a new examination and do another coursework.

Sometimes, a completely new piece of work will be set which is set specifically for Referral or LRA students and assesses all of the learning outcomes of the unit.

You will be sent details of exactly what you are required to do for your Referral or LRA and also, and this is most important, the time by which it must be achieved. If you do not successfully pass the LRA assessment in the timescale laid down then you will have lost your Referral or LRA and will then have to undertake a Repeat Assessment.

If you have been given a Referral (LRA) in a unit, to pass that unit you must get a minimum of 40% in the Referral assessment that is set for you. Once you have done that, the Unit Assessment Board will give you credit for that unit. However, the mark that you gained for that unit, (and the mark that will be used to contribute towards your final degree) will only be 40% no matter how you well you did in the assessment.

21. What is a Re-Unit or Repeat Assessment?

A Re-Unit (or Repeat Assessment as the University of Portsmouth now calls it), is when you are required to redo all the assessments of a unit. Students who are given a Re-Unit are normally advised to attend the unit, which is to join the next official run of the unit and to study it with that group of students. However, there is no requirement for the student to do this, all that is required is that the complete sets of assessments are submitted. The assessments will be marked in the normal way and an overall mark for the unit calculated in the normal way, that is by combining both coursework and examination marks. If the overall marks for the unit is 40% or higher then you will have passed your Re-Unit. The Unit Assessment Board will then award the credit points for that unit. However, the mark that is given for that unit, and the mark therefore that is used in the calculation of your degree, will only be 40%.

22. What is the fee for Referral and Re-Unit attempts in the course?

For Bachelor of Science (Hons) in Computing units,
Referral Fee is USD150
Re-Unit Fee is USD250

For the Professional Integration Programmes units,
Referral Fee is USD100
Re-Unit Fee is USD150

23. What is a Board of Examiners (BoE)?

The Board of Examiners is the Board that actually awards the honours degrees. At this board, all the marks (and grades) that you have gained in your units will be processed. You and your marks will be considered by a Board of Examiners once you have completed 120 credit points worth of units, even if you haven't passed all 120 credit points!

24. What decisions can a Board of Examiners make?

The decisions that a Board of Examiners makes depends upon how much credit points you have. If you have successfully passed 120 credit points then you will be awarded an honours degree which will be classified as either First class, Upper Second, Lower Second or Third class.

If you have less than 120 credit points then you will be offered a choice of either accepting an alternative award or of undertaking Limited Repeat Assessment and/or Repeat Assessment in units that would bring your credit score up to 120 so that you can be given an honours degree. If that happens, you will receive documentation detailing a date by which you have to notify  Cybercampus that you wish to accept the alternative award or that you wish to undertake the LRA or RA that you have been asked to do. It is extremely important that you do notify Cybercampus by that date. Failure to do so will probably mean that you will be given the alternative award at the next Board of Examiners and you will have lost your right to undertake the LRA or Repeat Assessment that you were previously offered.

25. What is an Alternative Award?

The decisions that a Board of Examiners makes depends upon how much credit points you have. If you have successfully passed 120 credit points then you will be awarded an honours degree which will be classified as either First class, Upper Second, Lower Second or Third class.

An alternative award, sometimes called an Exit Award, is a lower award than an honours degree which the University gives to students who do not qualify for an honours degree. Students who have attained 60 credits would be offered ordinary degree. Please note that the university would cease offering and awarding pass degree after September 2003.

26. Do I really have to pass 120 credit points to get an honours degree?

The only way of making sure that you will get an honours degree is to have passed 120 credit points. However, sometimes when a student has not passed all 120-credit points it is possible that the Board of Examiners will exercise what is called compensation in the students' favour.

27. Are students allowed to take more than 120 credit hours? Any extra charges?

Yes, students are allowed to take more than 120 credit hours. Each additional module is USD857 regardless 10 or 20 credit hours.

28. What is Compensation?

Compensation is where the Board of Examiners will give the credit points for a unit to a student even though the student has not achieved the pass mark in that unit. It can only occur at a Board of Examiners when the student is being considered for their final award. The Board of Examiners can only give compensation in 20 credit points. This means that they can compensate one 20-credit point unit. They could compensate one 10-credit point unit if that was what the student had not passed and they could in fact compensate two 10 credit point units if the student had not passed those. So the maximum amount of compensation is 20 credits.

However, if a student is compensated in a unit the original marks for that unit (the mark, which is below 40%,) will be the mark used in determining the overall degree classification.

A student cannot be compensated if they have undertaken any form of Referral (LRA) or Re-Unit (Repeat Assessment) in the course before the Board of Examiners considers them. This means that, if at an earlier Unit Assessment Board you are given a Referral which you then successfully take and pass, when it comes to your Board of Examiners you will not be eligible for compensation for any unit whatsoever.

29. What are the grading systems for the course?

The grading for the course is as follows,

30. What are the boundaries for the different classes of honours degrees?

The mark boundaries for the classification of honours degrees are as follows:

If your calculated mark is between 40 and 49.9, you will given a Third Class degree.
If your mark is between 50 and 59.9, you will be given a Second Class Lower Division degree.
If your mark is between 60 and 69.9, you will be given a Second Class Upper Division degree.
If your mark is 70 or higher, you will be awarded a First Class degree.

31. How are those marks calculated?

The Board of Examiners will look at two ways of obtaining a classification for your degree. The first way is the weighted average of all the marks you have obtained in the units, which make up your 120 credit points. Remember that this means that the two 10 credit point units will count less than the 20 credit points units! The weighted average will be calculated and your position determined with regard to the mark boundaries detailed above.

The second way that the Board of Examiners will assess your grade is slightly more complex. They will look at your best 80 credit points worth of grades. So, for example, supposing you had 40 credit points with grade A and 50 credit points at Grade B with the remaining 30 credit points being at Grade D, then you will have 80 credit points with a Grade B or better. The Board of Examiners will then award you a Second Class Upper Division degree, even though your weighted average might be lower than 60.

As another example, supposing you had 20 credit points at Grade B and 70 credit points at Grade C and 30 credit points at Grade D then this time you have 80 credit points (or more) at Grade C and above and you will be awarded a Second Class Lower Division degree.

32. What happens if my coursework is late?

When a coursework is set you are given a hand-in date. That hand-in date, once given, cannot be varied or changed no matter what circumstances may arise. If you hand your coursework in after that date then a marking penalty will be applied. If it is handed in up to 2 weeks after the official hand-in date the work will be marked but the mark you will be awarded will be no greater than 40%. If it is handed in more than 2 weeks after the hand-in date, it will be marked but the mark you will be awarded will be zero.

33. What should I do if I think I am going to be late handing in my coursework?

If you have a good reason for being late with your coursework then you need to complete and submit an Extenuating Circumstances form (ECF). This form enables you to detail the circumstances, which have resulted in you being late with your submission of coursework. An independent panel will make a judgement for the form whether to accept or reject your submission. If they accept your submission you will either be given another chance to do the coursework or the marking penalty on it will be lifted. The Unit Assessment Board will make that decision. If your submission is not accepted then the marking penalty will stand.

Suppose the Cybercampus server crashes when I am trying to submit my coursework? If something like this happens, an event which is outside anybody's control, this is not considered to be an exceptional circumstance case but is a course management issue. This means that it will be dealt with by the course team and appropriate recommendations made which would result in no assessment penalties being applied to students in such cases.