Assessment Brief
Module Name: Academic and Professional Skills
Trimester: May 2022
Academic Year: 2021-2022
| Module Code | Level | Credit Value | Module Leader |
| 4 | 30 | Ben Reid |
| Assessment code and title: | |
| Weighting: | 70% |
| Word limit: | 2500 words Where the submission exceeds the stipulated word limit by more than 10%, the submission will only be marked up to and including the additional 10%. Anything over this will not be included in the final grade for the assessment item. Abstracts, bibliographies, reference lists, appendices and footnotes are excluded from any word limit requirements. |
| Submission deadline: |
Please read this assessment brief in its entirety before starting work on the Assessment Task.
The Assessment Task
Purpose of the Assessment
This assessment has been designed to help you practice and demonstrate a number of key skills covered in the module. It will help you become familiar with the form and function of different sections of a formal report as you will encounter reports throughout your time at university and during your professional career. This assignment also asks you to analyse the impacts of a specific plan from several different perspectives – one related to your degree, as well as impacts related to society and to the environment. Doing so will help you develop your ability to apply critical thinking as well as to look at how issues can affect a range of different stakeholders. Producing the report will require you to undertake academic research as well to use this research, through referencing, to provide evidence and to avoid the risk of plagiarism. In writing the report you will need to plan carefully, present logical and well-structured paragraphs, and write in a way which is both clear and suitable for an academic audience. Finally, the report asks you to provide three recommendations – ways in which challenges identified in your analysis can be minimised or potential benefits can be maximised. Doing so will require you to use your critical and creative skills.
Module and Assignment Theme
The purpose of this module is to help you develop your employability skills as well as the skills you will need to progress and succeed at university. It is designed to familiarise you with various methods of assessment and to develop your self-confidence, enabling you to become increasingly independent learner and critical thinker.
Use of Study Skills
Core study skills include the demonstration of analytical abilities. These involve a depth of complexity of analysis, moving away from descriptive content and towards various connections between ideas. A depth of analysis would include an awareness of the existence of exceptions to general observations and include, amongst other things, an awareness of long and short-term impacts.
Work as this level should demonstrate the ability to understand an assignment and to plan effectively, showing a critical awareness in relation to the organisation of information and ideas. These should be presented in a logical way, avoiding digression or repetition. There will be an awareness of the form and function of each section of the report.
Writing and Communication
Students will demonstrate the accurate use of a range of both vocabulary and grammarin order to communicate their ideas in a clear and effective manner. Higher level students will also show an awareness of and facility with nuance in their use of language including the conventions of academic English.
Students should be able to use paragraphing to present their ideas in a clear and logical manner. Paragraphs should have a clear central focus and demonstrate a logical flow between ideas. This could be achieved through techniques such as the use of topic sentences and cohesive language as well an awareness of paragraph unity.
Work at this level will demonstrate an awareness of the conventions of Harvard Referencing as evidenced in the use of direct and indirect in-text citations and presentation of Harvard Reference lists. Students will produce clear and logical paraphrasing and summarising and show an awareness that this should support but not replace their own thinking and writing. At higher levels, students will demonstrate the ability to synthesise multiple sources.
Integration of Skills to Study and Life
Students at this level will begin to show an effective use of appropriate sources in order to support their ideas. There should be evidence of critical and logical thought behind the choice of evidence and a facility in its use to support and enhance the student’s own writing. An effective use of sources will also show an awareness of the importance of academic sources.
Students will show knowledge of a variety stakeholder perspectives. This should include an awareness and understanding of differing values and priorities as well as the possible influences on these perspectives.
Students should be able to apply creativity in order to provide logical solutions to problems.
The Assignment
Write a 2,500-word report responding to the 2-part task in the box below.
| Analyse the impacts of holding a new music festival. Use this analysis to recommend ways of maximising the benefits and/or minimising the challenges of holding a new music festival. |
Useful notes:
The report should analyse impacts in general. It should not be about a specific festival or area, although you may use specific examples.
You should analyse the impacts from three perspectives. The first should be A PERSPECTIVE RELATING TO YOUR DEGREE. The other perspectives should be ENVIRONMENTAL and SOCIAL impacts.
Ideally, each perspective should cover 2 to 3 different issues.
For students studying a degree related to Health and Social Care the first perspective should be The Health Impacts.
Relevant issues might include:
Public health issues (e.g. hearing loss/damage / disease outbreaks / drug/alcohol use)
Health and safety issues (e.g. risks from overcrowding / risks of assembling and transporting heavy equipment)
Mental health issues (e.g. positive effects on mood)
For students studying a degree related to Business the first perspective should be The Economic Impacts.
Relevant issues might include:
Local economic impacts (long and short-term job creation and revenue generation / influx of a large number of tourists in a short period of time and the pressure this involves)
Impacts on the hospitality and events industry (e.g. scalability of the festival / potential to expand to other locations / possible loss of revenue of festival is unsuccessful)
Costs to the taxpayer (e.g. policing / pressures on health services)
ALL students will also need to analyse two other perspectives. These perspectives are:
The impacts from an environmental perspective.
Relevant issues might include:
Impact on carbon footprint
The environmental impact of hosting the festival (e.g. damage to grass from tents/crowds / plastic waste being left etc.)
The environmental impact of any construction work that needs to be done
The impacts from a social perspective.
Relevant issues might include:
Impacts on local residents (could include: noise pollution; temporary overcrowding; commutes becoming more difficult due to pressure on roads and public transport)
Cultural impacts (e.g. international profile / cultural richness / community building potential)
Issues related to crime
Your report should follow the structure and suggested word counts below:
Cover Page
- Title of the report
- Title of the module
- Student Number (1xxxxxx)
- Date of submission
- Word count (excluding Executive Summary, citations, contents page and Reference List)
Executive Summary (not included in the word count)
- Summary of each section of the report and its key points
Contents Page (not included in the word count)
- Main section headings with page numbers
Introduction (suggested: 300 words)
- Definition of a music festival
- A discussion (with examples) of the various stakeholders involved in holding a new music festival
- A sentence summarising the main aims of the report
Analysis (suggested: 1500 words in total)
- One subsection for each of the 3 perspectives.
- Each subsection should have a subheading.
- All key ideas should be supported with reliable and relevant source evidence.
Conclusion (suggested: 200 words)
- Summary of key points from the Analysis section.
Recommendations (suggested: 500 words)
- Three recommendations presented as bullet points, with subheadings.
- Each recommendation must suggest a way to maximise a benefit or minimise a challenge which has been discussed in your Analysis section.
- These recommendations should be supported by research.
Reference List (not included in word count)
- This should follow the conventions of Harvard referencing.
Learning Outcomes
On successful completion of this assessment, you will be able to:
| Effectively use core study skills as an integral part of your learning experience. |
| b) Demonstrate adequate writing and communication abilities through the use of correct grammar, referencing, spelling, punctuation and understand and avoid plagiarism. |
| Integrate your newly acquired skills with one another and transfer them to areas of your studies and life. |
Assessment Submission
To submit your work, please go to the relevant to the module page –
Assessments tile and submit to Turnitin. Please note that essays and text-based reports should be submitted as Word documents and not PDFs or Mac files.
Written work will be subject to anti-plagiarism detection software. Turnitin checks student work for possible textual matches against internet available resources and its own proprietary database.
N.B Work emailed directly to your tutor will not be marked.
Late submission of work
For first sits, if an item of assessment is submitted late and an extension has not been granted, the following will apply:
- Within one week of the original deadline – work will be marked and returned with full feedback, and awarded a maximum bare pass grade (D-).
- More than one week from original deadline – grade achievable LG (L indicating late).
For resits there are no allowances for late submissions.
Extensions
The University of Northampton’s general policy with regard to extensions is to be supportive of students who have genuine difficulties, but not against pressures of work that could have reasonably been anticipated.
For full details please refer to the Extensions Policy. Extensions are only available for first sits – they are not available for resits.
Grading Rubric APS Report UoNL
| LOa) Effectively utilise core study skills as an integral part of their learning experience | LOb) Demonstrate adequate writing and communication abilities through use of grammar, referencing, spelling, and punctuation and understand and avoid plagiarism | LOe) Integration their newly acquired skills with one another and transfer them to areas of their studies and their lives | |
| Distinction | This work shows an extremely high level of complexity, demonstrating an excellent awareness of a range of perspectives and impacts in order to provide an outstanding depth of analysis. The presentation of the report shows you have an excellent understanding of the task and ability to plan a complex academic assignment and this is also reflected in your paragraphing. | Your written content is extremely clear and expresses your ideas with a high level of nuance and precision. Your use of referencing is excellent and demonstrates consistent control of all of the relevant conventions. | You have included a large range of sources and these are of a consistently strong academic standard. Your recommendations demonstrate an excellent ability to apply your logical and creative abilities to find solutions to practical problems. |
| Merit | This work shows a high level of complexity, demonstrating an impressive awareness of a range of perspectives and impacts in order to provide a very good depth of analysis. The presentation of the report shows you have understood the task completely and planned very well and this is also reflected in your paragraphing. | Your written content is very clear and successfully expresses your ideas with an awareness of nuance and precision. Your use of referencing demonstrates very good awareness of the relevant conventions. | You have included a medium range of sources and these are of an appropriate academic standard. Your recommendations demonstrate a strong ability to apply your logical and creative abilities to find solutions to practical problems. |
| Commended | This work shows a good ability to analyse, demonstrating awareness of a variety of perspectives and impacts and goes into some depth. The presentation of the report shows you have understood the task and planned appropriately, although this would benefit from further development. Your paragraphs display a good level of organisation. | Your written content is clear and successfully expresses your ideas with some evidence of nuance. Your use of referencing shows a good awareness of the relevant conventions with a few errors. | You have included a small-medium range of sources and most of these are of an appropriate academic standard. Your recommendations show that you are able to apply creativity and logic in order to provide solutions to problems. |
| Pass | Your work shows the ability to analyse, demonstrating some awareness of various perspectives and impacts, although there may be too much descriptive content. Planning of the report as well as organisation at paragraph level is evident but would benefit from further work. | You have attempted to write in a clear and accurate manner but at times your work would benefit from further precision and editing. Your use of referencing shows some awareness of the relevant conventions but there are frequent errors in the way you present in-text citations and/or your Harvard Reference List. | You are displaying the skill of using a few, mainly appropriate sources to support your ideas, and these are sometimes academic in nature. Your recommendations show some ability to apply creativity and logic in order to provide solutions to problems. |
| Fail | The analysis is not of a sufficient level, with an overreliance on descriptive content. The report would benefit from far more planning as your report is not logically organised. Your paragraphs lack clarity and would benefit from further work on the use of topic sentences and cohesive language. | Your written work lacks clarity and is not suitable for an academic audience. The work shows an insufficient awareness of the conventions of referencing and may demonstrate poor academic practice. | This work shows an insufficient use of sources which are not academic in nature. The recommendations lack a sufficient logical link to your analysis and evidence of creative abilities is very limited. |
| No Evidence | Work submitted is of no academic value | Work submitted is of no academic value | Work submitted is of no academic value |
