Project Allocations¶
Once everyone has entered their Bids, the Module Coordinator and supervisors will review them. It will take a couple of weeks to process the information. There are two phases.
Phase 1¶
Phase 1 of the Project Allocations takes place between the end of teaching and the start of the exams in January. During this stage, we are looking to match all of you with suitable projects and supervisors for those projects. We expect that it will be possible to match most of you with one of your three Bids.
There is a limit to the number of projects that each staff member can supervise; this number will depend on the each staff member’s other workload. In the first instance, the staff member who suggested the project would be the likely supervisor. If a particular supervisor is over-subscribed, we will either (i) look at one of your other project selections, or (ii) see if it is possible for another member of staff to supervise the project.
If there is a clash where several people have indicated a preference for one project, then we will need to make a choice about who will work on that topic. If it is sensible to divide the project to share the topic between two people, we may consider doing that. If a project topic is divided, each student taking the project would focus on a different part of the work. Otherwise, our decision will be influenced by factors including, but not limited to:
the suitability to your degree scheme;
your interest in finding out more information from the staff members;
whether you were motivated to confirm your project selection early or late in the process;
considering the suitability of the work for you based on your results on relevant modules.
We will complete Phase 1 by early January, but that will be subject to confirmation closer to the time. We will email everyone on the module when information about the project allocations is available.
Each year there are some students where we cannot make an allocation based on their first three Bids. If you are in that situation, we move to Phase 2 to find you a suitable project topic.
Phase 2¶
Phase 2 is where we resolve projects for anyone who did not recieve an allocation during Phase 1. This could be for a number of different reasons, including, but not limited to:
the student Bid for projects that were very popular. A choice was made to try and maximise the number of allocations that could be made in Phase 1. Unfortunately, the projects that the student Bid for were allocated to other students.
more students Bid for projects with a member of staff than the member of staff could supervise.
the student did not bid for three projects. Therefore, if it is not possible to make an allocation on the projects in the bid, there were no other options to look at.
the student did not engage with this process and submitted no bids. Whilst this is thankfully rare, it does happen. Please don’t take this approach. If you are struggling to identify some suitable topics, please contact the Module Co-ordinator.
If you are in Phase 2, the Module Co-ordinator will be in touch to discuss options for projects. This will be early in January. We will talk to you about your options and share with you the projects that are available at that point. We resolve these situations during January and the aim is to have a project ready for you to start your work when Semester 2 teaching starts.
Our experience of running these modules over the past few years tells us that many of you will be interested in different projects, so we hope that this will only affect a small number of students. In some recent years, the allocation was a challenge when a large number of students Bid for the same combination of project topics, sometimes in the same order of preference. That meant that more students ended up in Phase 2 than earlier years; we were able to resolved the situation for those who were in Phase 2.
