The rules for late submission penalties have changed for teaching periods that commence on or after 22 July 2024. The information on this page reflects the new rules and does not apply to assessment in earlier teaching periods. (Please refer to version 3.2 of the Marking and Feedback Procedure for earlier teaching periods).
Monash policy outlines the requirements for calculating penalties for assessment tasks submitted after the due date within the Marking and Feedback Procedure (sections 1.10 - 1.14). Specifically it states:
1.12Unless an extension or special consideration has been granted, students who submit an assessment task after the due date will receive a late-submission penalty of 5 percent of the available marks in that task. A further penalty of 5 percent of the available marks will be applied for each additional day (24-hour period), or part thereof, the assessment task is overdue.
1.13 Tasks submitted more than seven days after the due date will not be marked.
The Assessment Regime Procedure also states what mark should be used for threshold hurdle requirements. Specifically it states:
4.11 Where a late penalty is applied to an assessment task with a threshold hurdle, the penalised mark will be used to determine if the hurdle has been met.
Example scenarios
Students will receive a 5% deduction for each 24-hour period the assessment is submitted over the specified date and time. This means if a student submits:
40 minutes late, this is counted as 1 day late (late penalty waiver may apply if submitted late due to technical difficulties).
24 hours and 5 minutes late, this is counted as 2 days late.
The following scenarios indicate the correct ways to interpret Monash’s policy regarding calculation of late penalties for student assessments. They assume that the students in question have not applied for a short extension or special consideration and have simply submitted their assessment after the due date and time as specified on Moodle.
Expand the accordions to learn more about each example scenario.
Details
Student assessment worth 30 marks was due at 23:55 on a specified day. The student submitted their assessment at 00:55, an hour after the assessment was due.
Response 1
This is counted as 1 day late. The student receives a 5% penalty for the late submission. In this instance, 5% of 30 marks = 1.5 mark penalty.
Response 2
If the CE believes that the student submitted late because of a technical issue, they can decide to waive the late penalty as the assessment was submitted within an hour of the deadline.
Relevant procedure
Marking and Feedback Procedure:1.12.1 The chief examiner can waive a late penalty where a submission is received within an hour of the original submission time due to technical difficulties.
Details
An assessment is due at 23:55 on a Thursday and a student submits their assessment on Saturday morning at 00:55. The assessment is being calculated at 100 marks, but is worth 40% of the total marks for the unit.
Response
According to the policy, the student will receive a 5% deduction for each 24-hour period the assessment is submitted over the specified date and time (or part thereof). In this case, the penalty is calculated as being 2 days late: 2 days x 5% each day = 10 mark penalty deduction. In this instance, mark the student’s assessment out of 100, deduct the 10 mark late submission penalty THEN convert that mark to a percentage weighting for 40%.
Note: The late penalty waiver does not apply and does not reduce the late penalty to being counted as 1 day, as it only applies to the first hour after the assessment is due.
Details
A student submits an assessment 23 hours after the specified deadline, and at the same time, applies for a short extension.
Response
According to the Special Consideration Procedure, short extension requests must be submitted by 23.55 on the same day as the assessment submission deadline, therefore a short extension will not be granted and a late submission penalty of 5% will be applied to this assessment.
The special consideration form will not allow a late short extension application and instead change the request to a late special consideration application. Students will be asked to provide a reason for the late application and supporting documentation to be able to be assessed. If the special consideration application is approved, the late penalty will need to be removed when the extension is granted.
Relevant procedure
Special Consideration Procedure 1.4 Applications for short extensions must be submitted as soon as possible but not later than 11.55pm (time zone of the unit location) on the due date of the affected assessment task.
Details
A student uploads an incorrect assessment file by the deadline for an assessment task worth 20 marks. Neither the academic or the student realises this until one week after the submission deadline, when the academic commences marking the assessments.
Response
The onus is on the student to upload the correct file and to check. As this error has not been rectified by the student in the interim, according to the policy, the assessment is now more than 7 days late and will not be marked.
A student uploads an incorrect assessment file by the deadline for an assessment task worth 20 marks. The following day, the student realises the error and contacts the CE to alert them of their mistake.
Response
The CE accepts the correct file but imposes a 5% late penalty to this assessment task, therefore a 1 mark penalty.
Details
A hurdle assessment task is worth 20 marks. Students need to achieve a minimum of 9 marks to pass the hurdle. A number of students submit their hurdle assessment tasks after the set deadline.
Response
The CE marks the assessment tasks and then applies the late penalty for each student. The mark achieved AFTER the application of the late penalty determines whether a student has passed the hurdle. For example, a student receives 11 marks for the task and a 3 mark late penalty is applied, resulting
in 8 marks for the task. Thus, the student will have failed to pass the hurdle assessment.
Relevant procedure
Assessment Regime Procedure4.11 Where a late penalty is applied to an assessment task with a threshold hurdle, the penalised mark will be used to determine if the hurdle has been met.
Note that the Assessment Regime Procedure specifies the pass mark for threshold hurdles: 4.8 The threshold mark is 45 per cent of the marks available for the task, for any task that has a threshold hurdle.
Automated late penalties (Moodle Assignment only)
Automated late penalties can be applied when the following conditions are met:
Activity type: Moodle Assignment
Grade penalties is set to “Yes”
Moodle Gradebook: Grading schema is set to “Standard”
For assessments that do not meet these conditions, late penalties must be applied manually using mark overrides.
Where the automated late penalty setting has been enabled for Moodle Assignments, late penalties can be automatically calculated and applied in line with Monash policy (Marking and feedback procedure). Once a penalty has been applied to a grade, it will be marked for both teachers and students with a small red alert icon. Mousing over this icon will reveal the applied penalty.
