COVID-19 Information for students

The University will not be offering compensation for tuition fees due to the outbreak of Coronavirus (Covid-19) as teaching for all taught students – undergraduate and postgraduate – is continuing, from 23 March 2020. It is, however, being delivered remotely from 23 March, with alternative assessments and online exams being introduced.

If you are unhappy, you can of course make a complaint at any time under the University’s Complaint Handling Procedure (CHP) – you can find more details about this online. The CHP does not cover complaints which are requests for compensation only.

If you are experiencing financial hardship, we are here to help and can be contacted at studentfunding@ed.ac.uk.

The University of Edinburgh is very sorry that the Covid-19 outbreak is interrupting your stay. Please ensure that you follow these steps:

• You should return home if instructed to do so by your home institution.   
• We will be in close discussion with your home institution about your academic progress and the nature of the academic assessment that will be conducted. Please continue to use the online materials available for your programme.
• The Visiting Student Office is your first point of contact for CAHSS students if you have difficulties. Students in the other Colleges should contact their school teaching offices.

It is important that we have an accurate record of students who have, or will be, leaving Edinburgh. Please ensure that you:

• Let your School know as soon as possible by contacting your Student Support Office, Graduate School or Teaching Office.
• Update your address on MyEd so that we have current contact details for you.

We understand that many students have decided to return home. The University has decided to offer students the opportunity to terminate their accommodation lease with us if they wish.

Our student accommodation leases are normally fixed term, which means that there are no “break” points in the contract.

However, given the exceptional circumstances, we will now allow students to break – or end – their accommodation lease with 28 days’ notice. This decision has been made with advice from the University’s Students’ Association and replicates private sector leases.

The window in which to notify the University that you would like to break your lease in student accommodation is from 23 March until 31 March 2020. Your notice period will start on the day we receive your email requesting release from lease. Requests beyond this window cannot be considered. 

Students will not be charged after their lease has ended.  

If you wish to hand in your notice, please do so by email to the address below, including your name, address and matriculation number, in addition to your intended departure date which can be at any point in the notice period. If you have left but not yet removed your possessions, please arrange for a friend or neighbour to do so and confirm these arrangements in the email providing notice:

accom.allocations@ed.ac.uk

On receipt of this email, an ACE colleague will provide further advice as to the departure processes.

Students who have already handed in keys will be assumed to have triggered the lease break on 23 March 2020. If you have departed without returning your key, please let us know on the email address above.

We will continue to support those students who remain in our accommodation and are happy to discuss any accommodation requirements should you require to stay in Edinburgh beyond your lease end.

Travelling home from your term time address has been clarified as not beng essential travel. Therefore you should not attempt to travel home at this time.

This is a change from what we had previously understood to be the case, when this type of travel had initally been classed as essential and allowed.

• Generally, yes. Teaching is carrying on (although remotely) so assessment of learning should carry on too. So you are still expected to submit any outstanding coursework assignments as normal, in order to ensure Boards of Examiners have as much information as possible to assess your performance.
• In some cases, you may have already demonstrated that you have achieved the learning outcomes for your course – for example, because you have already completed a major course work assignment, or have completed lots of coursework assignments for a particular course. In such cases, your School may decide there is no need for any further assignments for that course this semester. Your School will advise you if that is the case.
• Schools will provide details regarding all outstanding assessments and any changes to deadlines. If you are in any doubt, (and on the principle of “better safe than sorry”) you are strongly advised to continue to work towards completing assessments as they become due.

• Pre-honours undergraduate students (SCQF levels 7 and 8): you will not have exams for pre-Honours (Years 1 and 2) courses. There may be a small number of exceptions to this, where a professional or statutory regulatory body (PSRB) requires students to complete further assessment. Your School will advise you if this is the case.
• Honours undergraduate and postgraduate (taught) students (SCQF levels 9, 10 and 11): exams will be replaced either with additional coursework assessment or timed take-home (“open-book”) exams offered remotely.

• This refers to a timed, take-home exam offered remotely for which you may use the text or material you have been studying.
• Your open book exam answers will be checked by Turnitin software to control for plagiarism and collusion.

No. Some students may already be in a position where they are carrying too many failed credits from Semester 1 in order to progress, or may be found to have failed courses taken this semester, which means they are not in a position to progress. Students who are unable to progress may be offered additional assessment during the summer vacation.

Possibly, yes. Professional or statutory regulatory body (PSRB) requirements for your course(s) may mean that you have to complete a further assessment. Your School will advise you if this is the case.

Yes. Changes to assessment outlined above apply to PGT students as well. ​​​​​​

We are not expecting to offer the normal, centrally-scheduled diet of in-person resit examinations in the summer. However, where students are unable to progress based on their Semester 1 and 2 results, Boards of Examiners will consider offering additional assessments in order to determine whether students have met relevant learning outcomes at resit. These assessments may be offered on a pass/fail basis, rather than for the award of a mark.

No. Boards of Examiners will make every effort to give you a grade for your course if they are able to do so. If Boards can’t do that – for example because too few assessments have been submitted – they will award a pass/fail instead.

The University’s approach to any major disruption to its operations is to minimise the impact on students while maintaining academic standards. It is important that you – and others, such as employers - can have confidence in your qualification; we do not think it would be helpful for the class of 2020 to be known as the class that graduated without doing their final exams. We will, however, be replacing traditional exams with “open book” exams or alternative assessments, as described above. Boards of Examiners will be provided will information about the nature of the disruption that taken place during the past academic year and will be provided with guidance on how to reflect this disruption when they are considering course and programme results.

• Schools are making arrangements to ensure that you can be assessed based on whatever experiments, studio projects etc. you have completed prior to the move to remote teaching. Where laboratory- or studio-based projects have not yet begun (e.g. for PGT students) Schools will put in place alternative, desk-based projects in order to assess students.
• Where field trips have been cancelled, Schools will be amending learning outcomes for those courses (if needed) in order to ensure that students are not disadvantaged.
• We are working on alternative approaches to assessing students for practice-based courses and programmes, including finding ways to allow students on these courses such as Art, Architecture etc to showcase their work.

We understand that there may be circumstances where you have difficulty completing assessment remotely due to having limited access to a laptop, PC or broadband. In these circumstances, please advise your School as soon as possible. Schools will consider alternative approaches and will discuss this with you. For example, it may be possible for you to complete assessment by hand and email scans via a mobile phone.

If your enquiry is regarding your return from outside the UK due to the Novel coronavirus (Covid-19) outbreak, including support regarding insurance, reimbursement, accommodation, or how your studies are affected, please contact Go Abroad / the Study and Work Away (SWAY) team on international.outgoing@ed.ac.uk and they will respond as soon as possible.

If you require emergency support - i.e. if your health and safety is being compromised - please remember you can always contact the University Security 24 hour emergency number on: +44 (0)131 650 2257. 

If your situation needs urgent attention, please contact the Head of Service directly, Isabell Majewsky Anderson, at isabell.majewsky@ed.ac.uk.

With a move to remote teaching from the 23 March, students are not expected to attend timetabled activities or meetings with supervisors in person.  We will be taking the following approach to engagement and attendance monitoring for the remainder of the semester:

• Undergraduate students should engage with the remote teaching provided by their School.  Results of assessments and exams will be recorded on your student record once marked.
• Postgraduate taught student engagement will be recorded through remote contact with your supervisor and dissertation hand in.
• Postgraduate research student engagement will be recorded through contact with your supervisor, remotely if needed.

Provided you engage with your studies remotely, there will be no impact on your Tier 4 Visa.  We do recognise that not it may not be possible for all students to engage with their studies in this way; therefore if you will not be engaging with your studies remotely, you must inform your school and take an Authorised Interruption of Study. 

The Home Office recognises the current situation is exceptional and has agreed that decisions on whether to withdraw a student from their studies are for sponsors to make.  What this means is that if you will be interrupting your studies for over 60 days due to the Covid-19 outbreak, there may be no impact on your Tier 4 visa at this time. To ensure we are aware of your circumstances, you must email the Student Immigration Service, studentimmigration@ed.ac.uk and provide details of your authorised interruption of study.

This guidance will be updated shortly, please bear with us. In the meantime, contact your supervisor or School graduate office for further advice.

In most cases, the assessment approach being used (for example the use of 48-hour, take-home exams) will mean that it is not necessary to offer additional time to students who would normally require this as a reasonable adjustment. A very small number of students usually receive the assistance of a scribe when they undertake written exams; where Schools are offering an alternative form of assessment to a student who would usually have the assistance of a scribe, they should contact the Student Disability Service for advice, disability.service@ed.ac.uk.

No. Due to the exceptional pressures that medical services are currently under, this requirement has been waived. You may however still approach others who know you for supporting evidence, for example, members of the Residence Life team, your personal tutor etc.

Boards of Examiners will be asked to take account of the general impact which the current situation will be having on students’ performance in assessment, and will be made aware of any changes which have been made to assessments for courses due to the pandemic. As was the case for industrial action, you need only inform the University of the impact of the pandemic upon your performance in assessment where you have experienced a unique impact, for example, due to your suffering ill health personally, or the death or serious illness of someone close to you.

This guidance will be updated shortly, please bear with us.

We regret that graduation ceremonies in Summer 2020 will not be running. We currently expect that degree certificates for students entitled to graduate this summer will be printed and mailed by the end of July 2020, with graduates being offered a series of options:

• to defer to an in-person ceremony in Winter 2020 or Summer 2021
• to attend a virtual graduation
• to receive their certificate and not attend a ceremony

If you have any immediate concerns, please contact infopoint@ed.ac.uk. 

Once you have completed all your assessments and exams, and these have been marked, the Board of Examiners will be able to meet and confer your degree. Once your degree has been conferred, you will be able to view the final result through your Higher Education Achievement Report (HEAR) or academic statement, both of which can be accessed through MyEd.  We are currently working to confirm a schedule of when Boards of Examiners will meet. 

Following the recent government and public health guidance surrounding the measures being put in place to contain the spread of Covid-19 and closure of pubs and restaurants, all cafes across the University are now closed. Catered Halls in Pollock Halls remains open with enhanced social distancing measures in place with ongoing operational review based on Government advice.

As a result of the UK and Scottish Government’s latest advice on social distancing, we are taking immediate steps to ensure that the health and safety of our students and frontline staff is protected as much as possible.

The Main Library in George Square will be closed from Monday 23rd March at 5pm, except for Counselling appointments due on Tuesday 24th March which will continue as planned.

We are extending loan periods during the closure and no fines will be accrued during this time. All loans – including standard loans, short loans and reserve – are renewed until 22nd June, after which we will review the situation.

For those of you who have appointments with Student Counselling later that week, they will be in touch with you directly. 

We are looking into alternative provision of safe study spaces for those that need it, and will update you on this as soon as we can. 

For more information about Library services and support for students visit the Library Updates page.

The Student Disability Service will now be supporting students over the phone or online. If you have an appointment scheduled, staff will be in touch to make arrangements for your scheduled appointment. If your appointment cannot be conducted via one of these alternative methods, it may be postponed until they are able to offer in-person appointments again.

For those receiving mentoring or tutoring support, your mentor or tutor will also contact you to arrange an alternative method of holding your sessions.

If you want to get in touch or have any questions email disability.service@ed.ac.uk

The Student Disability Service website

In line with the latest University and Government guidelines, the Student Counselling Service is now delivering remote support by telephone during the Coronavirus pandemic. 

Please visit the Student Counselling Service website for further information.

The Advice Place has now also moved to a fully remote service, the officers at Potterrow and Kings Buildings House are closed until further notice. They will be available to provide advice over the phone and via email within their usual opening hours.

Phone: 0131 650 9225

Email: advice@eusa.ed.ac.uk

The Advice Place website

The Careers Service has transitioned to online delivery with all staff working remotely. They will continue to work with students, graduates, recruiters and organisations to support employment and employability.

Visit the Careers Service website for more information

Feeling overwhelmed or anxious by the ongoing Coronavirus outbreak is understandable. We appreciate that you may have concerns about how this will impact you or your family and friends.

Ways to Manage Fears & Anxieties:

• Keep connected. Maintaining social networks, even online, can help maintain a sense of normality, and provide valuable outlets for sharing feelings and relieving stress.
• Be mindful of assumptions about others. Someone who has a cough or a fever does not necessarily have coronavirus.  Self-awareness is important in not stigmatizing others in our community.
• Stay healthy. Continue to practise good hygiene measures:
  • Avoid direct hand contact with your eyes, nose and mouth.
  • Wash hands with soap and water or alcohol hand sanitiser, after coughing or sneezing, after going to the toilet, and prior to eating and drinking.
  • When coughing or sneezing, cover your nose and mouth with disposable tissues and disposing of them in nearest waste bin after use.
  • Avoid contact with others who are sick and stay home while sick.

Read Young Minds’ blog on managing anxiety during the Coronavirus outbreak: What to do if you’re anxious about Coronavirus

If you would like further support, a number of resources are available to you:

• you can speak to the student support team in your School
• The Chaplaincy’s Listening Service will continue remotely throughout the Covid-19 closure period. If you would like an appointment with the Listening Service, please email: chaplain@ed.ac.uk
• The University Chaplaincy is also creating blogs to help us through Covid-19 lockdowns and meltdowns, and to raise our spirits
• the Residence Life team (if you are staying in University accommodation)
• the Students’ Association Advice Place is also running their service remotely and can be contacted via phone or email during their usual opening hours
• Student Counselling Service have lots of advice online about managing stress and anxiety
• The Student's Association have some dedicated Covid-19 webpages that cover taking care of your mental health during this challenging period and ways to volunteer in the local community

Information (in Chinese) on the services available to students can be found on these leaflets:

Student Services Guide Simplified Chinese

Student Services Guide Traditional Chinese

Self-help and online resources:

• Big White Wall
• Feeling Good App
• SilverCloud

If you have symptoms of coronavirus (Covid-19) – including those with a diagnosis of coronavirus (Covid-19) infection, who must remain at home until they are well – you should self-isolate for 7 days from when your symptoms started.

The most common symptoms of coronavirus (Covid-19) are recent onset of:

• new continuous cough and/or
• high temperature

For most people, coronavirus (Covid-19) will be a mild infection.

• if you have symptoms of coronavirus infection (Covid-19), however mild, stay at home and do not leave your house for 7 days from when your symptoms started
• this action will help protect others in your community whilst you are infectious
• plan ahead and ask others for help to ensure that you can successfully stay at home
• stay at least 2 metres (about 3 steps) away from other people in your home whenever possible
• sleep alone, if that is possible
• wash your hands regularly for 20 seconds, each time using soap and water
• stay away from vulnerable individuals such as the elderly and those with underlying health conditions as much as possible
• you do not need to call NHS111 to go into self-isolation. If your symptoms worsen during home isolation or are no better after 7 days contact NHS 111 online. If you have no internet access, you should call NHS 111. For a medical emergency dial 999

Further information can be found on the UK Government website.

If you have received medical advice from your GP or the NHS 111 service that you must self-isolate, either because you have recently returned from a specific country or have been in close contact with someone who has contracted the virus, you must stay at home for 14 calendar days.

You should:

• Self isolate - stay in your room, flat or home and avoid contact with other people as you would with the flu guidance on self-isolation.  See the government's advice on self-isolation for Covid-19 for more information
• Use the online guide at NHSinform.scot online guide to determine what actions to take next
• If appropriate, call your GP during office hours and NHS 24 on 111 out of office hours or if you are not registered with a GP, and inform them of your recent travel to the country

You must not go to the GP (doctors) surgery or hospital without calling ahead first.

There is no charge to overseas visitors for the diagnosis and treatment of the Novel coronavirus (Covid-19).

You should inform your School or Department of your absence in the normal manner (line manager etc. for staff, personal tutor etc. for students).

More information is also available on the TravelHealthPro website. 

If you have been asked to self-isolate by the NHS, you can request assistance from the University if you are in a University Residence. Please contact your Residence Manager if you are in this situation.

For the latest information on travel advice and self-isolation then please visit the Travel Advice and Self-Isolation FAQs. 

The University has taken the decision to restrict all international travel by University staff and students to “essential travel only” for a minimum of two months.

All requests to travel internationally for work or study must be accompanied by a both a justification and a careful risk assessment, and authorised by your relevant Head of School or Department. This is with immediate effect.

“Essential Travel” does not include international field trips and international student placements. If you are due to undertake a field trip or international placement before 31 May 2020, we advise that you do not proceed with the visit.