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Exam Information

Department Policy

Midterm exams should be handed back to the students by the TA's or you, the instructor. Neither departmental assistants nor Student Affairs are authorized to return any exams to students. Since your TA's will not be available after the grades have been turned in, you may have to use alternative methods for the return of final exams. It is an infringement of students' privacy to leave graded exams in a public place for pick-up.

The Department makes provisions to return final exams during the third week of the following quarter for courses with 60 students or more. You will be contacted by a department assistant in charge of exam distribution to inquire whether or not you would like to utilize this service. Exams that are not retrieved must be retained for one quarter after the quarter in which the exam was taken, but please be advised that students can request for regrade up to one year after a course was taken.

For exam accommodations for Students with Disabilities, please refer to OSD Testing Accommodation Services.

Exam Grading Parties

An Exam Grading Party is a course meeting of staff in which exams are graded. Funds are available to pay for food and soft drinks served if the Exam Grading Party meets the required criteria:

  • must involve at least one UG tutor
  • must be supervised by course instructor
  • must be attended by at least 2 people including the instructor
  • duration must be at least 4 consecutive hours
  • approval for reimbursement must be given by department chair

Reimbursement is limited to $8 per person who attended the Exam Grading Party, to include Instructors, Teaching Assistants, Tutors and Readers. Please bring receipts to a departmental Instructional Support Assistant in APM 3018 and provide them with the following information:

  • Course Number
  • Date of Exam Grading Party
  • Duration of Exam Grading Party
  • Names and positions of course staff present
  • Amount of the reimbursement request
  • Name, Social Security number and address of where either check or sure pay receipt should be mailed.

UCSD Policy on Midterm/Final Examinations

Approved by the Committee on Educational Policy (CEP)

Midterm Examinations

  • Faculty are obliged to have printed in the Schedule of Classes the date and time of any midterm which is to be given outside of the regularly scheduled class hours (beginning with the Winter 2001 Schedule of Classes).
  • Additionally, any midterm given outside of the regularly scheduled class hours must be announced in a syllabus distributed to the class at the beginning of the quarter.

Final Examinations

  • Final examinations may not be given at any time before the final examination week without explicit permission of CEP.
  • Although the instructor may give a final examination at an alternative time during final examination week with the approval of CEP, students must be permitted to take an equivalent examination at the originally scheduled time if they so desire.
  • An instructor may administer an examination at an alternative time if a valid reason is given by the student for not taking the regularly scheduled examination. Valid reasons include: religious holidays, verified illnesses, family disasters.
  • Academic Senate Regulations specify that final examinations are required of all undergraduate courses, unless an exception has been approved by CEP or the CEP Subcommittee on Undergraduate Courses. Final examinations are, however, normally not required in laboratory courses.
  • No student may be excused from assigned final examinations.
  • A final examination must, whenever practicable, be written and must be completed by all participants within a previously announced time limit.
  • Examinations in non-laboratory courses may not exceed three hours duration.
  • The instructor may not require a "take-home" final examination to be turned in before the date and hour at which the examination in the course was scheduled by the Registrar's Office.
  • Faculty members (including visiting faculty) must be present and available during finals week when the final examinations of their courses are given. In cases where the instructor's absence cannot be avoided, the department chair or program director must seek CEP approval to designate another faculty member to administer the final examination. Nevertheless, faculty course instructors themselves must assign grades for the courses they teach.
  • CEP will not recommend approval of faculty absences during finals week unless arrangements to administer the final examination have been worked out in advance with the department chair or program director.

Questions regarding the application of the rules may be addressed to your department chair, a college provost, or the office of the Academic Senate.



by Dr. Radut.