Students have expressed their anger at suspected thefts of essays in the School of English.

One second year student, told LS how he found his essay feedback missing when going to collect it. He told LS: “I thought someone had stolen it because of the mark and panicked that it would somehow affect my grade”.

In a separate incident, Molly Forsythe, also in her second year,  did not receive a returned hard copy of one of her essays submitted during her first year: “My tutor had no idea what had happened to it, but said he definitely recorded a mark for it and my module scores confirmed this. I’ve since suspected it was taken, accidentally or on purpose.”

Commenting on the incident a spokesperson for the School of English said: “Unfortunately, we were not informed of the incident at the time, but would be very happy to discuss the matter further.”

Currently, all Level 1 students in the School of English submit their work in hard copy to the School’s Student Office, which is then placed in the relevant tutor’s pigeon hole.

The School of English spokesperson said: “Both the Student Office and the Staff Office are not left unattended without being locked.

They added: “Work is returned to students either by the tutors in person or via folders/pigeonholes outside tutors’ offices.”

Forsythe admitted she was disturbed by the disappearance, saying: “I don’t like the idea of someone else having my work. The School really need to make more consistent use of Turnitin. There is no chance of theft or loss
that way.”

Sean Hayes