About

Student Complaints

With over 15,000 students, hundreds of programmes and many different services, Caledonian is a complex place. This page tells you what to do if you are not happy with something we do. We need to know so that we can put things right.

The Student Complaint, Mediation and Resolution Procedure is the formal route for you to make a complaint about any service we provide. Complaints can often be dealt with informally; you should use all informal routes before moving on to the formal student complaint procedure.

Informal Routes for student complaints

Programme/teaching issues

You should use the following informal routes to resolve your complaint:

• Talk to your class representative. (There is normally one rep for every year of your programme.) Ask them to raise the matter at the next Student/Staff Consultative Group.
• Email the Programme Organiser or speak to them directly.
• Speak to your Academic Adviser.
• Speak to your Module Leader.

Your class representative may have put up a poster with their contact details, or you can get their name from your programme or module leader. Your programme and module handbook list the other contacts.

If all these fail, use the formal Student Complaint, Mediation and Resolution Procedure.

Issues about services outwith Schools/teaching divisions

You can use the same routes as for programme/teaching issues. There are also other options:

• "Your Views" - you can fill in the your views online form or you will find cards in the Library, the Learning Café and the labs. You can use these to suggest improvements as well as make complaints about the services.
• IT complaints - you can email the IT HelpDesk (cithelp@gcal.ac.uk).
• Complaints about registration, exams or graduation - you can write or speak to the Head of Academic Registry or any of the staff on duty.

The best way to sort things out is to speak directly with the right person. You will find contact details for most services for students through the student home page. You may also find it useful to talk to the Students' Association Welfare Adviser They can go with you to an informal meeting.

The Mental Health and Wellbeing Service can also help with personal issues.

Formal routes for student complaints

The student complaint, mediation and resolution procedure

The Student Complaint, Mediation and Resolution Procedure (Word document) is on the Quality Office website. You can download a complaint form (Request for formal investigation) from there. The form is very easy to complete. If you do need help or advice, staff in the Quality Office can help and will talk through the complaint process with you.

Academic appeal procedure

An Appeal is a formal procedure by which you can request reconsideration of the result of any assessment(s) in which you have been unsuccessful.

The academic appeals procedure deals with the following:

• Problems related to your academic assessment such as marks for your coursework and exams
• Whether you can proceed to the next year of your programme
• An issue related to your honours classification

These decisions are all based on academic judgement and are not covered by the Complaints, Mediation and Resolution Procedure. You will find information about academic appeals in your programme handbook and on the Exams Guide website.