While the students at aberystwyth appreciate the demanding and extreme circumstances the university is in, the majority of students are really struggling. Last year a no detriment policy was put in place, this benefitted us immensely. However, this year is taking a much larger toll on the students with their mental health readilly regressing as well as their routines being constantly changed. We are in the middle of a pandemic where we are seeing friends and family being increasingly anxious as well as some becoming dangerously ill with the virus. We are constantly reminded of the effect of the virus, the deaths are steadily increasing as well as a rapid increase in those who are infected. Jobs are being lost, family life is chnaging, our living arrangements are constantly being chnaged and yet we are expected to complete our university work to the highest standard when we have so much going on around us. No one has dealt with a situation like this before and yet we, as students, are expected to continue completing work to the same standard which such a lack of support from the university. So many of us are seriously concerned about our grades and the outcone that we will face at the end of university. We shouldn't be held back but recieving bad grades for a situation we cant control.

A no detriment policy would use our average grading from before the pandemic so that we would have a true representation of our ability. We would not be penalised for the effect that the pandemic has had on our grades, but wouldn't hold us back if we produced work to a higher standard. For third years our grades this year have a higher impact of our final grade than second year, this means that the majority of our grade is impaxted by the work we are producing in a global pandemic. This is totally unrealistic to expect students to achieve high grades during a time like this. If we were to recieve a no detriment policy for the remainder of the pandemic, the students would feel more supported and benefit our mental health drastically. The drop out rates would also decrease as students would feel like they could actually achieve the grades they deserve. It would guve students the opportunity to focus on more important things like their mental health, physical health and family.