Mitigating Circumstances: A Step by Step Guide
Sometimes students can be affected by difficult and unexpected personal or medical circumstances.
These are known as ‘mitigating circumstances’.
By informing the College of your circumstances, you can give yourself time to focus on your wellbeing
and on taking care of yourself. Your wellbeing matters most and you can apply for extensions or exam
deferrals so that you can focus on your studies once you’re feeling able to do so. The College has
procedures to help students who can’t meet deadlines or attend exams due to mitigating circumstances.
We’ve put together this step by step guide to help if you are in this situation:
1. Get the Mitigating Circumstances Form
This form can be used for essays and/or exams. It can be used in advance, for example to request an
extension or request to defer the exam. If you miss an essay deadline or an exam, you can also submit this
form up to 7 days afterwards to request a replacement attempt. If you attempted an exam and wish to withdraw
from it, you can also use this form to request this in the 7 days following the exam.
The Mitigating Circumstances Form should be submitted as soon as possible however you can submit it up
until 7 days after the essay deadline or exam.
2. Complete the form
The first part of the form asks for straightforward details, such as your name and contact information.
The second part of the form asks you to give details about the affected assignments. You’d need to give details
of the essay deadline or date of the exam and answer either ‘Yes or No’ in the relevant boxes to show whether
you’ve submitted the essay or attended the exam. If you’re applying for a coursework extension in advance,
there’s space to include your preferred new deadline.
The form also asks for a statement, where you’ll need to explain your circumstances, as well as how they’ve
impacted you and your work. We’ve written a statement template guide to help you with this.
Once you’ve written your statement, one of our advisors will be happy to check it for you. Please feel free to
email it to [email protected].
3. Provide evidence
Forms must be accompanied by third party evidence, which must be submitted no later than 21 days after the
essay deadline or exam. Medical notes and other letters must be signed and on headed paper, to show that
they are official. If the evidence is not in English, a translation must be provided along with the original. If you’re
unsure about what evidence to provide, see our evidence guide and contact [email protected] if you have any
questions.
4. Submit the form
Your programme handbook should tell you where to submit the mitigating circumstances forms. If not, we’ve
got a directory that’ll show you where to take the form.
5. Receive the outcome
Departments take up to 7 calendar days to consider the Mitigating Circumstances Form, so you should hear
back within one week. They can give a ‘provisional acceptance’ subject to receipt of evidence, so if you’ve
submitted the form but you’re still waiting for evidence, they should be able to give you a provisional answer.
If your essay or exam is before the 7 day timeframe, and you haven’t received a response, we would
recommend contacting the department directly. Let them know your deadline/exam date and ask if they can
respond as soon as possible.
If you haven’t heard back before the deadline/exam, be aware that the College has a ‘fit to sit’ policy, which
means that if you decide to attend an exam or submit an essay on or before the original deadline, you’re
declaring yourself fit and well enough to do so. This means your mitigating circumstances form will become
void and won’t be considered. If you’ve not back and you’re concerned, please do get in touch with us.
If you’re concerned or have questions, contact the KCLSU Advice team at kclsu.org/advice/ for independent
and confidential support.