UNIVERSITY of Limerick has blamed “a manual error” for two students having had qualifications rescinded earlier this year.
The issue arose when two students who had sat exams in 2021 at diploma and degree levels were awarded their academic qualifications, only for the University to take them back following a review of the grading system in place there.
In a statement to the Limerick Post, a spokesman for UL said that the university’s grading system was not to blame, but instead it was “manual error” that led to the rescinding of the qualifications.
“The rescinding of two awards was not due to any flaw in the UL Student Records System (i.e. the SITS system) and resulted from a manual error where the UL progression process is dependent upon on manual checks on a student report.”
“In the case of these two rescinded awards, the manual checks did not take place,” the spokesman said.
UL said that it had recently conducted a review of 41,130 other graduate awards dating back to 2015 and had not identified any other errors in grades given to students.
The UL spokesman said: “UL has taken measures to ensure that there is no recurrence of the manual errors identified in these two cases.”
“UL has full confidence in the processing of its records and undertakes regular process and quality reviews.”
The statement from the University also said that as the student population has grown significantly in recent years, the grading system in place was designed to accommodate this, but that as numbers had grown so much, an automated system is required to deal with the volume.
“UL student numbers have grown significantly, new programme formats have been developed and programme provision has become more flexible to accommodate a diversity of learner needs and support the Government’s and employers’ reskilling and upskilling agenda,” the spokesman explained.
“This requires a standardised and automated system capable of dealing with the requirements for the provision of knowledge and skills in the 21st century.”
