Academic policies and procedures
If you cannot attend on-site education with compulsory attendance (work groups or practicals) because you are ill, in quarantine or, for example, waiting for a test result, you must first report to your course coordinator.
If you are unable to attend classes and tests for a prolonged period of time (e.g. one period or semester), you'll have to report this to your study advisor and course coordinator. They will inform you about what to do next.
Within all Master's programmes one or more research projects are mandatory. Please see ‘Study programme’ for general information on such projects in your curriculum. In many cases, a research project may be carried out outside of the university, in the form of an internship at a company, research institute, or another university. This can be in the Netherlands as well as abroad (see also: ‘study abroad’).
You are required to apply for approval of your research project by submitting a request via OSIRIS Student. Please select ‘My Cases’, ‘Start Case’ and then ‘Research Project GSNS’. Important: in order to apply completely and correctly, you must have discussed the project setup with your intended project supervisor beforehand! We advise you to study the request form previous to discussing it with your supervisor, or fill it out together, to make sure you obtain all of the information required.
After submitting your request, it will be forwarded to your master’s programme coordinator, the board of examiners and student affairs for checks and approvals. After approval of your project it will be automatically registered in OSIRIS. If something needs to be amended, you will be notified by email. Please DO NOT register yourself in OSIRIS for the relevant research project courses. You will be automatically registered upon approval of the Research Application Form.
- Please note that this protocol (English version) applies when a project is delayed.
- In case of a project or internship outside of Utrecht University, please make sure you fill out the Work Placement Agreement in OSIRIS Student / My Cases. This agreement will be available for filling out in OSIRIS Student/My Cases after you have submitted your initial request for research project approval.
- Only for students that have started their research project prior to 1 November 2018: your project supervisor will fill out the assessment form part 1 at the end of the first part of your project, and the assessment form part 2 at the end of the second part of your project and hand it in at the Science Student Desk (in pdf) in order to have your grade registered in Osiris. (For all other students the assessment is done in Osiris Docent and the paper forms cannot be accepted anymore.)
- These guidelines apply for the evaluation of the research project.
The Graduate School of Natural Sciences (GSNS) has a general statute concerning its Education and Examination Regulations (EER). The most recent version of these regulations can be found below. Specific regulations for each of the Master's programmes of the GSNS are listed in the Annex (available in English only).
The EER 2023-2024 applies to current students.
EER 2023-2024:
- Education and Examination Regulations (English)
- Education and Examination Regulations (Dutch)
- Annex (English)
Requests to the Board of Examiners
On several occasions throughout your studies, you may need permissions from the Board of Examiners. All requests are to be submitted through Osiris Student. In Osiris Student, you will select 'MyCases', 'Start Case' and then choose the approprate request type. The following types of requests are available:
- Exemptions (EER art 5.13)
- Approval of not UU taught courses (EER art 3.7)
- Approval of (elective) courses/study programme (EER art. 3.6.9)
- Approval of a profile
- Approval of a TWIN programme (EER art. 3.8, 5.13)
- Delay of graduation date (EER art. 6.1)
- Delay of research or thesis project (EER, appendix)
- Extra testing provision (EER art. 5.8) (includes requests for online proctoring, go to this webpage for more information about online proctoring)
- Other requests
Tasks and responsibilities
The Board of Examiners of the Graduate School of Natural Sciences (GSNS) is mandated by law to uphold the quality of tests and exams within the School. The Board of Examiners has eight members; a chair, six scientific staff members who each represent a cluster of Master's programmes (and chair an executive panel if so indicated) and one non-Faculty member. The Board of Examiners is supported in its work by a Secretary. The legal responsibilities of the Board of Examiners include organisation and coordination of examinations, granting exemptions and approval of final achievements for individual Master's programmes, and handing out MSc-diplomas and supplements at graduation ceremonies.
Official documents
The GSNS has a general statute concerning its 'Rules and Regulations' (also available in Dutch) , in which all matters concerning the appointment and organisation of the Board of Examiners, and also its responsibilities concerning (final) examinations and the degree programme are laid down.
Members of the Board 2022/2023
- Dr. A.M. Vredenberg - Chair
- Dr. Prof. dr. F.J. (Floris) Bex - Member, Artificial Intelligence
- Prof. dr. ir. G.J.M. (Guus) Velders - Member, Physics
- Dr. G. (Guido) Bacciagaluppi - Member, History and Philosophy of Science
- Prof. dr. mr. H. (Henry) Prakken - Member, Information Science and Computer Science
- Dr. M. (Marc-Etienne) Moret - Member, Chemical Sciences
- Prof. dr. E.P (Erik) van den Ban - Member, Mathematical Sciences
- Dr. M. (Michael) Behrisch - Member, Applied Data Science
- Dr. J.A. (Jan Andries) Post - External Member
- B. (Björn) Scheenstra - Secretary
Contact
The Secretary of the board can be contacted through: science.boardofexaminers.gsns@uu.nl.
Your UU-grades abroad
To help foreign universities to interpret the value of our grades, UU publishes Grading Tables:
- a table for Bachelor’s courses and
- a table for Master’s courses.
The Grading Tables provide statistical distributions of grades awarded at Utrecht University. They show which percentage of all passing grades that were awarded in the three most recent academic years were (rounded-off) a 6.0, a 6.5, a 7.5, etc. The tables will be published on the International Diploma Supplement of all students who graduate after September 1st 2017.
In addition to the Grading Tables, UU also publishes a weighted average grade on the ten point scale on your International Diploma Supplement.
What do Grading Tables not show?
Grading Tables do not show whether you belong to the 10% (or any other percentage) of your class. The tables do not contain information about the average either, nor are they just about your fellow students.
The most recent Grading Tables (September 2019 – August 2022)
| Grade | Frequency |
|---|---|
| 6.0 | 17.11% |
| 6.5 | 16.70% |
| 7.0 | 20.20% |
| 7.5 | 19.52% |
| 8.0 | 14.56% |
| 8.5 | 7.64% |
| 9.0 | 3.15% |
| 9.5 | 0.89% |
| 10.0 | 0.23% |
| Grade | Frequency |
|---|---|
| 6.0 | 8.21% |
| 6.5 | 9.63% |
| 7.0 | 16.98% |
| 7.5 | 22.33% |
| 8.0 | 22.79% |
| 8.5 | 12.76% |
| 9.0 | 5.62% |
| 9.5 | 1.26% |
| 10.0 | 0.42% |
Grade Point Average substituted by Grading Tables
Until 1 September 2017, Utrecht University published a Grade Point Average (GPA) to provide help institutions abroad to interpret UU-grades. Many Anglo-Saxon universities use this four point scale to express their weighted average grade. The GPA always needs clarification. The standards according to which the GPA is calculated differ between (international) universities.
Utrecht University considers any form of academic dishonesty to be a very serious offense. Utrecht University expects each student to be familiar with and to observe the norms and values that ensure academic integrity.The most serious forms of deception that can impair this integrity are fraud and plagiarism. Plagiarism is a form of fraud and is defined as the wrongful appropriation of another author’s work without proper citation. See the further elaboration on what may be considered fraud or plagiarism.
If the university discovers a case of fraud or plagiarism, then the study programme’s Board of Examiners may implement sanctions on the offender. The most serious sanction that the Board of Examiners may implement is the submission of a request for expulsion to the Executive Board.
If you feel you have not been treated properly by someone employed by Utrecht University, or if you disagree with a decision that affects you personally, you can respond in a number of ways. You can submit a complaint, an objection or an appeal.
For the full details about the various procedures and which procedure is applicable for your situation, visit Complaints, objections and appeals.
Utrecht University processes a substantial volume of personal data. In accordance with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) the university is responsible for ensuring that personal data is processed properly. Also see the Privacy Statement on the Utrecht University website.