2025-26 Part B Examination in Mathematics

1. Introduction

This document sets out the examination conventions for the Part B Examination in Mathematics. Examination conventions are the formal record of the specific assessment standards for the course or courses to which they apply. The first part of this document is written explicitly for candidates and explains how your work will be marked and how these marks will be used to derive your final classification for Parts A and B.  The second part of the document contains additional information for assessors and examiners but some will also be of interest to candidates.  So if you want to know what criteria are used in deciding  the marking scheme for each examination question, then  see appendix D2.  Similarly the criteria used to decide how many marks your extended essay or project  should receive are given in appendix H. The qualitative  class descriptors tell you what level of performance is required in order to get a particular class and can be found in appendix J.  You might also find the checklist used by question setters useful, see appendix D1, and the note about the recalibration of marks, see appendix I.

The Mathematics Teaching Committee directs that the Part B Examination be in accordance with these conventions. The Board of Examiners may only make minor deviations from these conventions in exceptional circumstances and only after the consent of the Mathematics Teaching Committee or the Proctors. This document is in all ways subsidiary to the current:

• Examination Regulations,
• Examinations and Assessments Framework

2. Progression through University Examinations

To qualify for your BA or MMath in Mathematics you must pass a First and Second Public Examination.  The First Public Examination in Mathematics is currently called the Preliminary Examination in Mathematics and is taken at the end of the first year. You must pass the Preliminary Examination before you can be admitted to the Second Public Examination.

The Second Public Examination has three parts: Part A taken at the end of the second year, Part B taken at the end of the third year and Part C taken at the end of the fourth year. You cannot enter for Part B until you have completed Part A of the examination. In order to proceed to Part C, a candidate must achieve an upper second class standard or better in Part B alone i.e. a weighted average of 59.5 or above in their Part B assessments. Candidates who satisfy the examiners in Part A and Part B only, qualify for the award of BA in Mathematics; candidates who satisfy the examiners for all three parts qualify for the award of MMath in Mathematics, with two associated classifications.

3. Part B Assessment Units

3.1 Mathematics Department Units

3.2 Statistics Department Units

3.3 Computer Science Department Units

3.4 Other Units

4. Examination Conduct

You will receive advice from the Examiners before each part of your finals examination. These notices provide information on the conduct of the examinations, including the use of calculators and how to complete and submit answer booklets. Notices from Examiners from previous years can be found on the Mathematical Institute's website. 

Penalties for Non-attendance

Rules governing non-attendance at examinations and any consequent penalties are set out in full in the Examination Regulations (Regulations for the Conduct of University Examinations, Part 14).

If you will be prevented by illness or other urgent cause from attending one of your examinations you should contact your college office or college tutor as soon as possible. 

In cases where the Proctors do not believe there are satisfactory reasons for non-attendance or an application to the Proctors has not been submitted, this will result in failure of the whole of Part B. In such a case, the examiners will award a fail for each of the Part B assessments.

5. Penalties for Late Submission of Coursework

The Examination Regulations stipulate specific dates for submission of coursework to the examiners. This includes the Part B extended essays, BSP projects, BO1.1 extended essays and any coursework you need to complete if you take a course taught by another department.  Rules governing late submission and any consequent penalties are set out in full in the Examination Regulations (Regulations for the Conduct of University Examinations, Part 14). For 2025-26, all written assessments are to be submitted online.

If you will be prevented by illness or other urgent cause from submitting your coursework on time you should contact your college office or college tutor as soon as possible.  Your college is able to submit an application for an extension of time to the Proctors on your behalf.  

The scale of penalties agreed by the board of examiners in relation to late submissions of assessed items, without an accepted reason, is set out below:

Note: The penalty will be a percentage reduction of the maximum total mark available for the work. For example, if a 10% penalty is applied to an assessment given a USM out of 100 then 10 marks would be deducted. The final mark awarded after application of the penalty cannot be below 0.  

Failure to submit a required element of assessment, without an accepted reason, will result in the failure of the whole of Part B. In such a case, the examiners will award a fail for each of the Part B assessments.

6. Plagiarism

You are reminded of the importance of avoiding any plagiarism, please see http://www.ox.ac.uk/students/academic/guidance/skills/plagiarism for further guidance. Depending on their severity, cases of suspected plagiarism may be referred to the Proctors for investigation or may be dealt with by the board of examiners. If dealt with by the board of examiners as a case of poor academic practice, the examiners may deduct marks (for lack of adequate referencing, poor use of citation conventions etc) of up to 10% of the marks available for the assessment. Where the consequence of the marks deduction would result in both the failure of the assessment and of the programme, the case must be referred to the Proctors.

We will reserve the right to conduct follow-up viva voce exams to check candidates' understanding of the examined material, even where these are not currently specified in the Examination Regulations.

7. Marking of Mathematics Examinations

The majority of mathematics examinations are marked by a single assessor or examiner according to a pre-agreed mark scheme which is strictly adhered to.  The examination scripts are then checked by an independent checker to ensure that all work has been marked, and that the marks have been correctly totalled and recorded.

The Part B extended essays, BSP projects, are independently double-marked, normally by the project supervisor and one other assessor.  The two marks are then reconciled to give the overall mark awarded.  The reconciliation of marks is overseen by the examiners and follows the department's reconciliation procedure (see https://www.maths.ox.ac.uk/members/students/undergraduate-courses/teaching-and-learning/projects/essays).

The BO1.1 examination and essays are independently double-marked, normally by the course lecturer and one other assessor.  The two marks are then reconciled to give the overall mark awarded.  The reconciliation of marks is overseen by the examiners and follows the department's reconciliation procedure (see https://https://www.maths.ox.ac.uk/members/students/undergraduate-courses/teaching-and-learning/projects/essays).

Please see the appendices for the qualitative descriptors of the bands of marks awarded to examination answers (appendix D2) and extended essays/projects (appendix H).

8. University Standardised Marks

Marks for each individual examination paper will be reported as University Standardised Marks (USMs). The object of the USMs is to allow direct comparison between the results of examinations in different subjects. Raw marks may be turned into USMs by scaling, sometimes necessary to ensure that all papers are fairly and equally rewarded. The correspondence between the USM ranges and classes is as follows:

•  70-100: First Class
• 60-69: Upper Second Class
• 50-59: Lower Second Class
• 40-49: Third Class
• 30-39: Pass
• 0-29: Fail

These marks reflect the qualitative descriptors given in appendix J.

9. Analysis of Marks

There are two parts to the BA examinations: Part A and Part B

9.1 Part A
At the end of the Part A Examination, a candidate will be awarded a University Standardised Mark (USM) for each of the papers taken.  The USMs awarded will be carried forward into a classification as described below.

9.2 Part B
The Board of Examiners for Part B will assign USMs for each paper taken in Part B and may scale the raw marks to arrive at the USMs reported to candidates.

The examiners may choose to scale marks where in their academic judgement:

• a paper was more difficult or easier than in previous years, and/or
• a paper has generated a spread of marks which are not a fair reflection of student performance on the University's standard scale for the expression of agreed final marks, i.e. the marks do not reflect the qualitative marks descriptors.

Such scaling is used to ensure that all papers are fairly and equally rewarded.

When scaling the raw marks on a paper the examiners will consider the following:

• the relative difficulty of the paper compared to the other Part B papers;
• the report submitted by the assessor who set and marked the paper.

Examiners will use their academic judgement to ensure that appropriate USMs are awarded and may use further statistics to check that the marks assigned fairly reflect the students' performances on a paper.  Examiners may also review a sample of papers either side of the classification borderlines to ensure that the outcome of scaling is consistent with the qualitative marks descriptors.

The USMs awarded to a candidate for papers in Part B will be aggregated with the USMs from Part A to arrive at a classification.

9.3 Aggregation of marks for the award of the classification on the successful completion of Parts A and B

All successful candidates will be awarded a classification after the Part B examination. This classification will be based on the following rules (agreed by the Mathematics Teaching Committee) which include a Strong Paper Rule.

Every candidate must offer

• 10 units at Part A (counting A2 as a double-unit and, for candidates offering 6 long options, two of the long options papers as half units)
• 8 units (or equivalent) at Part B.

The relative weightings of the Parts is as follows:

• The weighting of Part A is 40%.
• The weighting of Part B is 60%.

This split is equivalent to a weight of 4 per Part A unit (10 x 4 = 40) and a weight of 7.5 per Part B unit (8 x 7.5 = 60). If a candidate has marks for fewer than 10+8 units in Parts A+B, then their weighted average is calculated using 4s and 7.5s as the weights.

Strong Paper Rule

A candidate will have satisfied the First Class, resp., Upper Second Class, resp., Lower Second Class strong paper rule if at least 6 units from Parts A and B lie in that class (or better) and include at least 2 of them in Part B. 

To give an example, a candidate will have satisfied the Upper Second Class strong paper rule if the USMs of at least (the equivalent of) 6 units are at least Upper Second Class marks with (the equivalent of) at least 2 Upper Second Class units at Part B level.

In the following AvUSM = Average weighted USM for Parts A and B together (symmetrically rounded [62.49 will be rounded down and 62.50 will be rounded up]);

• First Class: AvUSM ≥70 and the First Class Strong Paper Rule satisfied.
• Upper Second Class: AvUSM ≥ 70 and the First Class Strong Paper Rule not satisfied OR 70 > AvUSM ≥ 60 and the Upper Second Class Strong Paper Rule satisfied.
• Lower Second Class: 70 > AvUSM ≥ 60 and  the Upper Second Class Strong Paper Rule not satisfied OR 60 > AvUSM ≥ 50 and the Lower Second Class Strong Paper Rule satisfied.
• Third Class: 60 > AvUSM ≥ 50  and the Lower Second Class Strong Paper Rule not satisfied OR 50 > AvUSM ≥ 40.
• Pass: 40 > AvUSM ≥ 30.
• Fail: AvUSM < 30.

BA in Mathematics

Any candidate who satisfies the examiners for Parts A and B (and who does not subsequently enter for and achieve Honours for Part C) may supplicate for the Honours degree of the Bachelor of Arts in Mathematics with the classification as described above, provided that they have fulfilled all the conditions for admission to a degree of the University. 

MMath in Mathematics

In order to proceed to Part C, a candidate must satisfy the progression requirement given in Section 2. Candidates successfully completing Part C will receive a separate classification based on their University Standardised Marks in Part C papers. Note that successful candidates may only supplicate for one degree -- either a BA or an MMath. The MMath has two classifications associated with it but a successful candidate will only be awarded an MMath degree.

10. Resits

A candidate who obtains only a pass or fails to satisfy the examiners in Parts A & B may retake Part B on at most one subsequent occasion.  Candidates who retake Part B are not permitted to continue to Part C. The Part B assessments would be retaken the following Trinity term.

11. Alternative Examination Arrangements and Mitigating Circumstances Notices to Examiners

A candidate in any University Examination with specific learning difficulties or disability/illness may apply through the Senior Tutor of their college for alternative examination arrangements relating to their condition.  Please see http://www.ox.ac.uk/students/academic/exams/arrangements for further information on the process.

Candidates who would like the examiners to be aware of any mitigating circumstances that may have affected their performance before or during an examination are advised to discuss their circumstances with their college and consult the Examination Regulations (Part 13). The candidate's college will submit the Mitigating Circumstances Notice to Examiners for forwarding to the relevant chair of examiners.

A candidate’s final outcome will first be considered using the classification rules/final outcome rules as described above in section 4. The exam board will then consider any further information they have on individual circumstances.

Where a candidate or candidates have made a submission, under Part 13 of the Regulations for Conduct of University Examinations, that unforeseen circumstances may have had an impact on their performance in an examination, a subset of the board (the ‘Mitigating Circumstances Panel’) will meet to discuss the individual applications and band the seriousness of each application on a scale of 1-3 with 1 indicating minor impact, 2 indicating moderate impact, and 3 indicating very serious impact. The Panel will evaluate, on the basis of the information provided to it, the relevance of the circumstances to examinations and assessment, and the strength of the evidence provided in support.  Examiners will also note whether all or a subset of papers were affected, being aware that it is possible for circumstances to have different levels of impact on different papers. The banding information will be used at the final board of examiners meeting to decide whether and how to adjust a candidate’s results. Further information on the procedure is provided in the Examinations and Assessments Framework, Policy and Guidance for examiners, Annex C and information for students is provided at https://www.ox.ac.uk/students/academic/exams/guidance.  

12. Declared to have Deserved Honours (DH)

Candidates who have indicated they wish to be considered for DDH will first be considered for a classified degree, taking into account any individual Mitigating Circumstances Notices to Examiners. If that is not possible and they meet the DDH eligibility criteria, they will be awarded DDH. Further details can be found here: https://www.ox.ac.uk/students/academic/declared-awards.

13. Examiners for 2025-26

The internal examiners are:
Prof. Xenia de la Ossa,
Prof. Radek Erban,
Prof. Ben Green,
Prof. Gui-Qiang Chen, 
Prof. Alain Goriely (Chair), 
Dr Neil Laws

The external examiners are:
Dr Ed Brambley, The Univeristy of Warwick,
Prof. Matt Tointon, The University of Bristol

It must be stressed that to preserve the independence of the Examiners, you should not make contact directly with them about matters relating to the content or marking of papers. Any  communication must be via the Senior Tutor of your college, who will, if they deem the matter of importance, contact the Proctors. The Proctors in turn communicate with the Chair of Examiners. 

Appendices

A. Chair of Examiners

B. Paperwork for Examiners

C. Protocol for Setting Examination Papers

D. Form of Questions

E. Attendance at Examinations

F. Marking

G. Checking

H. Coursework

I. Recalibration of Marks

J. Classification of Candidates

K. Mitigating Circumstances Notices to Examiners

L. Post Examination

A. Chair of Examiners

Regulations for the conduct of examinations, Part 6, in the Examination Regulations covers the appointment of the Chair. The Committee for the Nomination of Examiners will usually appoint a Chair in Trinity Term of the preceding year.

B. Paperwork for Examiners

Internal examiners should ensure that they are equipped with the following
documents which will be provided by the Maths Institute's
administration, in electronic copy.

• The Examination Regulations.
• The Examinations and Assessment Framework.
• The Aims and Objectives of the mathematics courses, as agreed by the Teaching Committee.
• The Course Handbook and the Lecture Synopses.
• The examination papers from the preceding two years.
• The Examiners' Reports on these examinations.
• Reports to the Teaching Committee on individual papers where appropriate.
• The published tables of Class Percentage Figures for both Prelims and Finals for the last two years (as published in the Examiners' Reports) referring to guidelines from Education Committee.

When there are new examinations, material from previous years will not be directly applicable, but there may be specimen examination papers produced by the Teaching Committee. The Chair of Examiners will ensure that the external examiners are (where appropriate) also provided with copies of these documents.

C. Protocol for Setting Examination Papers

Each paper should be drafted by the appropriate lecturer, and checked by the lecturer of the complementary course if appropriate, or some other qualified person nominated by the examiners. Examiners and assessors are reminded that throughout the examination process security is very important. Examination papers must be passed via the secure SharePoint Online site.

D. Form of Questions

Each question will be marked out of 25 and should be divided into two to four parts. An indication of the raw marks available for each part of each question should be given on the question paper.

D1 Checklist for Assessors

The examiners should provide assessors drafting papers with the following checklist of important considerations.

1. Is the question on the syllabus (as in the Exam Regulations or Course Handbook (including the Lecture Synopses))?
2. Is the mathematics correct?
3. Is the notation and terminology standard/obvious/defined? (Standard usage from the course is acceptable without explanation but phrases such as ‘as in the lectures' should be avoided.)
4. Is it unambiguous? Is it clear what may be assumed, what detail is required, and what would constitute a complete answer?
5. Is the form of presentation familiar/inviting/readable?
6. Does each question have an easy start, worth around 8 marks, which might be readily and routinely completed? This should not wholly be testing memory of previous material explicitly seen.
7. Is there material designed to differentiate at the class borderlines?
   1. For the II(i)/II(ii) borderline is there a part that tests understanding of standard concepts/techniques (whilst still being rather straightforward) which tests whether a candidate can do any more than  merely memorise the bookwork?
   2. For the I/II(i) borderline is there a part for which a full solution requires truly excellent understanding and skill?
8. Would a II(i)/II(ii) borderline candidate on average achieve around 11/20 marks for the question?   Is a mark of 16+ unlikely to be achieved by a significant number of candidates who are not of first-class standard?
9. Is it the case that only exceptional first-class students are capable of gaining full marks?
10. Is each question overall of a straightforward character?
11. Are the questions as a whole fairly spread across the syllabus?
12. Are the questions of comparable difficulty to one another?
13. Are the questions sufficiently different from those set in recent years?
14. Is the question formatted using the oxmathexam.cls file?
15. Does the question, adequately spaced, fit on a single page?

D2 Marking Schemes and Model Solutions

Assessors setting questions should be asked to provide complete model solutions indicating everything that a candidate would be expected to write to answer the question fully.  The model solutions and marking scheme need to be sufficiently clear and comprehensive to be meaningful to an external examiner. Those setting questions should be aware the solutions may be released to students in the future.

The model solution for each question should be accompanied by a marking scheme out of 25.  The marking scheme should aim to ensure that the following qualitative criteria hold (see also the class descriptors given in appendix J:

20--25 marks: A completely, or almost completely, correct answer, showing excellent understanding of the concepts and skill in carrying through the arguments and/or calculations; minor slips or omissions only.

13--19 marks: A good though not complete answer, showing understanding of the concepts and competence in handling the arguments and/or calculations, and some evidence of problem-solving ability.  Such an answer might consist of an excellent answer to a substantial part of the question, or a good answer to the whole question which nevertheless shows some flaws in calculation or in understanding or in both.

7--12 marks: Standard material has been substantially and correctly answered with some possible minor progress on to other parts of the question.

0--6 marks: Some progress has been made with elementary, accessible material.

Assessors should classify the parts of each question under the headings: 

• B1: bookwork material: explicitly seen before; 
• B2: routine material, easily synthesized from material explicitly seen before;
• S: similar to material seen before;
• N: new, demanding good command of concepts and/or methods.

D3 Approval of Papers and Marking Schemes

The papers and marking schemes are reviewed by the whole examination board, including the external examiners (see further below).  Minor edits may be made to a paper in consultation with the assessor. Once approved a camera ready copy of the paper should be produced.  Assessors should be asked to  check carefully and `sign-off' the camera ready copy of their paper.

D4 Review by External Examiners

The external examiners should be consulted according to the agreed timetable, and provided with stable draft papers; full annotated solutions indicating what is bookwork and standard material, and with the proposed marking scheme. Comments from the external examiners on each paper will be sent to each respective assessor. The examiners should not finalise any paper without taking into account the comments of the external examiners. External examiners should be informed of action taken in response to their comments.

E. Attendance at Examinations

Attendance of Assessors will not be possible in the examination. If a candidate believes there is an error in the examination paper, they should state their assumption of the exam question within their exam script. This will then enable the Exam Board to investigate and if necessary take the error into consideration in the normal way.

F. Marking

The examiners should provide each assessor with the marking scheme approved by the examining board. Letters to assessors in previous years are commended; the following points must be made:

Marking Schemes: It is the responsibility of assessors to use the final approved marking scheme, discarding earlier drafts. Marking schemes should be applied consistently. However, should it become clear while marking that the allocation of marks should be changed, please ensure that this is done consistently, and advise the examiners of this change.

Mark Ranges in FHS papers: All questions are to be marked out of 25.

Marking: The examiners will want to review at least some of the scripts during the classification process. They will not want to re-mark (since they cannot do so consistently across all candidates).  They will want to be able to see quickly where marks have been gained. They will also want to be sure that all of a candidate's work has been taken into consideration. Markers are therefore asked to observe the following:

• indicate on the mark sheets, using whole numbers, the available marks awarded for each part of a question.
• Include the total mark awarded for each questions in the highlighted sections of the marksheet
• enter the integral numerical mark for each question, taking care to distinguish between an attempt scoring zero marks (enter “0”) and a non-attempt (enter “-”)
• not write comments in the questions section, but, if necessary write on the second tab of the mark sheets provided. 

Mark Sheets: Mark sheets will be supplied. Assessors are asked to compute the check-sum for each candidate, which is the last two digits of the candidate number(taken as a two digit number) plus the sum of raw marks. Assessors will be asked to return the marksheet electronically through the marking site on Sharepoint.

Reports: Assessors will provide the examiners with a brief report on the performance of the candidates on each paper (or part-paper) to assist them in their deliberation on calibration; in particular assessors are invited to suggest where class boundaries could be drawn. Model examples of helpful reports are available.

G. Checking the Marks

The examiners should ensure that their procedures allow for:

• an independent arithmetic check of the correctness of the addition of the partial marks for each question;
• an independent check of the marks entered into the marks database for each candidate;
• an audit trail for these checks.

Graduate research students are employed to carry out such checks.  The standard document `Instructions for Graduate Checkers' is kept in the Academic Office, and gives details.  

Logging Scripts
The examiners should ensure that a central log is kept of the whereabouts of all scripts; and should instruct all markers to return `sporadic' scripts or answers to the central contact with a note of explanation.

Availability of Assessors
The Chair must ensure that those appointed as assessors are informed of the examiners' timetables, and are made aware that they must be available for consultation by the examiners until the signing of the Class List, and in particular during the input and checking of the marks. 

H. Coursework

The examiners should pay careful attention to what candidates have been told about the assessment of coursework in the Examination Regulations and the Course Handbook.  All coursework is independently marked by at least two assessors.  The examiners will oversee the reconciliation of marks, following the established reconciliation procedure (https://www.maths.ox.ac.uk/members/students/undergraduate-courses/teaching-and-learning/projects/essays).  If reconciliation is not possible, an additional marker should be appointed.

Projects and extended essays will be be assessed with reference to the following qualitative descriptors:

For BSP Projects

90--100: Work of potentially publishable standard, as evidenced by originality or insight. The work should show depth and accuracy, and should have a clear focus.  It is likely to go beyond the normal level for part B.  The standard one sees in winners of one of the examination prizes.
80--89: Work in this range will be at the level of a strong candidate for a DPhil applicant.  The project will be an easy choice as a winner of a college essay prize. It will have depth, accuracy and a clear focus. It will show a strong command of material at least at the level of
part B.  It is likely to contain original material, which may take the form of new mathematical propositions, new examples, or new calculations, for example.
70--79: The work submitted is of a generally high order, with depth, clarity and accuracy, but may have minor errors in content and/or deficiencies in presentation. It may contain original material, at least in the sense of new examples or calculations.
60--69: The candidate shows a good grasp of their subject, but without the command and clarity required for first class marks. Presentation, referencing and bibliography should be good, and the mathematics should have no more than minor errors.
50--59: The work shows an adequate grasp of the subject, but is likely to be marred by having material at too low a level, by serious or frequent errors, a high proportion of indiscriminate information, or poor presentation and references.
40--49: The candidate shows reasonable understanding of parts of the basic material, but reveals an inadequate competence with others.  The material may be at too low a level. There are likely to be high levels of error or irrelevance, muddled or superficial ideas, or very poor writing style. 
30--39: The candidate shows some limited grasp of at least part of the material.
0--29: Little evidence of understanding of the topic. The work is likely to show major misunderstanding and confusion.

For BOE and BO1.1 extended essays

70--100: The candidate shows clear focus on the question, with precise and accurate details (mathematical and other), imaginative selection of examples and appropriate selection and quality (rather than quantity) of sources, and cogent argument, supported by evidence.

Within this band the following finer gradations may be helpful:
90--100: Work of publishable quality.
80--89: Demonstrates originality of content or insight.  Work at the upper end of this range could be publishable after minor improvements. Would be an appropriate entry for a national or university prize.
70--79: Work of high or very high quality, but perhaps lacking the originality that would be expected of publishable work. Might be a good candidate, for example, for a college prize.

60--69: Work that addresses the given topic, with solid command of factual content, reasonable range of examples and sources, coherent argument and analysis, and correct referencing and bibliography.

(Essays at the lower end of this range may lack some of these qualities or show them only intermittently.)
50--59: Work with some use of facts, sources, and arguments, but marred by one of more of a failure to address the topic, serious or frequent errors of fact, a high proportion of indiscriminate information, speculation or unsupported argument, and incomplete or inaccurate referencing.
40--49: The candidate shows some knowledge of the topic but the work is marred by several of the following:- high levels of error or irrelevance, muddled or superficial ideas, incoherent or non-existent argument, incompetent use of sources, or very poor writing style.
30--39: The work demonstrates a little knowledge of the topic but no coherent argument.
0--29: The work demonstrates almost no knowledge of the topic.

I. Recalibration of Marks

Examination marks will be reported to candidates in the form of University Standardised Marks. The object of the USM is to allow direct comparison between the results of examination in different subjects. Examiners may recalibrate raw marks to arrive at the USMs reported to candidates. On each paper, any recalibration of marks should be done without disturbing the order of candidates.  In order to ensure fair treatment examiners are reminded that they may exercise individual consideration in assigning USMs for candidates whose marks lie outside the standard pattern. 

Examiners should take note of the distribution of USMs above 60 and above 70 in the Examination in a normal year and not depart from it without good reason.  Information about the distribution of USMs in the Examination for recent matriculation years will be provided by the Teaching Committee.
 
The USMs reported to candidates for each paper should be symmetrically rounded.

J. Classification of Candidates

The average USM ranges used in the classifications reflect the following general Qualitative Class Descriptors agreed by the Teaching Committee:

First Class: the candidate shows excellent skills in reasoning, deductive logic and problem-solving. They demonstrate an excellent knowledge of the material, and can use that in unfamiliar contexts.

Upper Second Class: the candidate shows good or very good skills in reasoning, deductive logic and problem-solving. They demonstrate a good or very good  knowledge of much of the material.

Lower Second Class: the candidate shows adequate basic skills in reasoning, deductive logic and problem-solving. They demonstrate a sound knowledge of much of the material.

Third Class: the candidate shows reasonable understanding of at least part of the basic material and some skills in reasoning, deductive logic and problem-solving.

Pass: the candidate shows some limited grasp of at least part of the basic material. [Note that the aggregation rules in some circumstances allow a stronger performance on some papers to compensate for a weaker performance on others.]

Fail: little evidence of competence in the topics examined; the work is likely to show major misunderstanding and confusion, coupled with inaccurate calculations; the answers to questions attempted are likely to be fragmentary only

K. Mitigating Circumstances Notices to Examiners

The University's policy on the use of medical and other certificates is available at https://academic.admin.ox.ac.uk/mitigating-circumstances#collapse2154556.

As Part B is part of a multi-part examination there may be two sets of mitigating circumstances notices for the examiners to consider, notices submitted to the final meeting of the Part A examiners and notices submitted to the final meeting of the Part B examiners. The Part A examiners will pass on a notice submitted at Part A, along with a note of the any action taken.  The Part B examiners can take the evidence submitted at Part A into account when classifying a candidate. However they should note that the Part A USMs cannot be altered at this stage, so in order to take such evidence into account the Part B examiners may have to suspend the examining conventions when awarding a classification.

L. Post Examination

Examiners should ensure that the following are deposited with the Head of Academic Administration (or Undergraduate Studies Officer), Mathematical Institute:

• a definitive record of individual USMs, signed off by one of the examiners (to be kept on file at the Institute for reference and for use in later examinations);
• all records of the Examination not otherwise destroyed and declarations relating to the destruction of examination material (as instructed by the Proctors);
• full marking schemes, including any subsequent amendments;
• LaTeX source files for the papers incorporating any corrections.