| Students’ Evaluations
The Graduate Program takes explicitly into consideration the idiosyncratic characteristics of participating students and tries to continuously assist them in terms of their independence and guidance. To this end, the teachers make use of various teaching and learning methods for assessing the performance of their students, such as:
- Homework and lab exercises; their grade is part of the total assessment grading,
- Midterm exams (this is also part of the total exam grade),
- Oral exams,
- Multiple choice exams,
- The in-class participation of students.
Moreover, based on the students’ performance, the Director of the Graduate Program may decide that certain tutorials are needed.
Monitoring the progress of the students
The monitoring of the students’ progress is an assisting procyclical measure that can diagnose in time any potential problem associated with the poor performance of the program’s participants; in that sense, this methodology allows the in time detection of excellent students who wish and have the talent to continue for PhD studies (either in Greece or overseas); at the same time, this process assists the detection of students whose talents match those demanded by banks or other business entities in the private sector. Furthermore, this process enhances a climate of noble competition among students, while it enhances the program’s reliability.
The monitoring process is achieved through primary channels:
- The constant communication between teachers and students (the goal of communication is achieved easier thanks to the small number of participant students),
- The consistent students’ evaluation process.
Students’ Evaluation
Students receive constant information about the methods of their evaluation coming from the Department’s site, as well as from the Open eClass (eclass.unipi.gr) platform, which informs about the availability of electronic notes, studies, articles, announcements, instructions on writing a homework paper, their evaluation criteria and the curriculum of their courses.
Students’ evaluation follows various methods, such as final exams, midterm exams, short and/or long homework papers, case studies, in-class participation, homework presentations or a combination of them.
Overall, all methods of evaluation cover the greatest part of the course curriculum and their objective is to assess not only the theoretical efficiency, but also the analytical efficiency of the students; these methods clearly show the students’ capacity to comprehend the curriculum associated with each course.
In cases where the students’ evaluation is based on a final exam, the examination process is performed either at the end of the semester, or at the end of the teaching period that includes all forms of the educational activities.
The course grading runs from 0 to 10: in particular, the range from 0 to 4,99 displays a failing status, while that from 5 to 10 displays a pass status. The results of the grading activity are submitted to the Secretariat Office within 15 days after the exam date.
In cases where students do not participate in exams, they are getting an F grade, which compels them to have a second-chance exam within a reasonable period. If this is repeated, students are entitled to have a third chance exam. If this occurs again, then students are entitled to have a fourth-chance exam, but this time they need to pay a fee of 300 euros. This amount could be changed after a Departmental decision. At the same time, the Director of the Program may decide students to receive extra tutorial assistance prior to the 3rd or 4th repetitive exam. Finally, if students fail their fourth-chance exam, they are entitled to submit an application to the Chair of the Department for a final exam organized not by the instructor of the course, but by a three-member Committee appointed by the Department. The members of that Committee come either from the Department’s academic staff or from another university’s academic staff under the restriction that their expertise area is close to that of the failed course.