Read our Student Charter

We'll work in partnership with you and the Students’ Union to strengthen your student experience.

We'll listen to and respond to your voice to create a learning environment that meets your expectations, and helps shape the wider student experience. You'll have access to a range of opportunities to share your views and opinions on what we are doing well and what we can do better.

Together with the Students’ Union, we'll inform you of the changes made based on your feedback in a variety of ways, including:

• Student Academic Rep System (which includes student-staff panels)
• Speak Week/Student Wins (student voice campaign)
• Student intranet
• Learning Central
• Student app
• Student news (via email, newsletters, newspapers etc.)

The Students’ Union represents the student voice to us by engaging you in democratic processes and campaigns, listening to your voice and identifying recurrent issues in student feedback.

The Students’ Union produces the Student View each year, identifying trends and making recommendations for further improvements to the student experience.

Partnership Projects are established each academic session in response to the Student View. These projects are jointly led by students and staff, monitored by the Student View Steering Group and reported regularly to University Council.

We provide an education that seeks to excite, motivate, challenge, and support you.

Our programmes of study are designed to enable you to engage actively in your learning, become part of our learning community, and benefit from our excellent research culture.

Our teaching supports you to become independent learners who are enthusiastic and committed to your studies.

Our physical, social and virtual learning spaces are designed in partnership with our students. We work together to imbed academic integrity within the learning community.

We have an inspiring and enriching environment which offers a wide range of educational, social, cultural and sporting experiences to motivate, challenge and support you to succeed.

Our commitment relies upon an active partnership between you and the University. This ensures that you are not unduly impacted by programme changes. We and the Student’s Union welcome feedback from you on all aspects of student life.

We support student learning by providing regular, timely (no more than 20 working days for coursework), and constructive feedback to develop your knowledge and skills.

We work with you to personalise your learning and support you during your studies.

We are committed to a safe and mentally healthy learning, working and living environment where every member of the our community can thrive.

We have worked with partners to adopt a whole institution approach to mental health in line with best practice in the sector. We have set this out in 'Enabling Success: A Strategy for Creating a Mentally Healthy University'.

We seek to ensure that positive mental health and wellbeing are an integral part of everything that we do. Working in partnership with our staff, students, and the wider community is central to laying the foundation for lifelong positive mental health and creating a mentally healthy University.

We are committed to addressing student suicide and are working with partners to become a Suicide Safer University using the Suicide-Safer Universities (PDF, 7MB) framework.

You have access to a range of services which support and enhance student life. These exist primarily to remove barriers to learning, ensure you can achieve to the best of your academic ability, and ensure we all live and work in a safe, inclusive community.

This includes services to:

• support wellbeing
• develop new skills
• manage money
• settle into university and student life.

We encourage you to make use of all the support available, if needed, at the earliest opportunity.

The Students’ Union has seven full-time sabbatical officers and ten campaign officers to represent your needs and interests.

We are proud to be a Welsh university at the heart of our capital city. We encourage all of you to engage with Welsh culture, including events such as the National Eisteddfod, Tafwyl, Diwrnod Shw’mae Su'mae, and Sŵn festival.

We are committed to providing an environment that promotes and facilitates the use of the Welsh language. Find out about opportunities to study through the medium of Welsh.

We aim to continue to raise awareness of the Welsh language and culture among all our students and expect that you will demonstrate respect for the equal status of the Welsh and English languages in public life in Wales. Our Welsh for All programme enables all students to gain and develop Welsh language skills.

We have a branch of the Coleg Cymraeg Cenedlaethol within the university and we work in partnership with Coleg Cymraeg to develop and deliver a sustainable portfolio of Welsh-medium educational provision and to meet the needs of our Welsh-speaking students and future employers.

We are committed to the Welsh Language Standards, providing a Welsh-speaking Personal Tutor for you where requested and ensuring that if you wish to do so, you can undertake assessments and examinations in Welsh (with no delay to results).

The Undeb Myfyrwyr Cymraeg Caerdydd (UMCC) is a Union within the Students’ Union which is responsible for representing Welsh speakers, learners, and all those interested in Welsh language and culture during your time with us. There is also Welsh representation in the form of an elected Welsh Language Officer.

Learn more about the National Eisteddfod, Tafwyl, Diwrnod Shw’mae Su'mae, and Sŵn festival.

We welcome and support students from a wide range of backgrounds, forming a diverse global community.

You can expect to be welcomed and helped to adapt to university life, whether an undergraduate or postgraduate student, and in return are expected to contribute to a welcoming environment for all.

We expect you and our staff to behave appropriately, both individually and in groups, treating each other and our local community and resources with dignity, courtesy, and respect.

We expect all of you to accept your responsibilities to each other at all times and work together to ensure everyone can live and study free from discrimination and harassment. This includes time spent on placement, taking part in sporting or other extracurricular activities, and time spent on social media.

The Student Conduct Procedure sets out our expectations of student conduct. If you're studying on programmes that lead to professional registration, you'll also have to follow the Fitness to Practise Procedure.

We provide an environment where you can feel confident to inform us if your university experience is adversely affected by the behaviour of fellow students or staff using the Student Complaints Procedure.

We promote a climate of equal opportunity for all students, and are committed to meeting our statutory responsibilities regarding equality, diversity, safeguarding, and protected characteristics.

Meanwhile, we encourage you to contribute to a positive campus culture by taking responsibility for learning about one another, being supportive of each other, and informing us of any issues.

We provide opportunities and support for you to develop qualities that equip you to succeed as global citizens and to make a real difference in the world.

We encourage you to engage with real-world concerns within Cardiff, Wales and internationally. We seek to provide you with opportunities to develop skills for the future and the attributes to become effective, engaged global citizens.

We support you to recognise the skills you are developing so you can articulate and record these appropriately. Some examples of these are featured on the Higher Education Achievement Report (HEAR).

You are encouraged to enhance your skills by taking advantage of the opportunities provided, either as part of a programme of study or as an extracurricular activity. This includes international study and placements, both as part of your course and in addition to your course.

This can be during the academic year or in the summer recess, and by participating in extracurricular activities. This could include:

• Student Mentor Scheme
• Athletic Union
• Societies
• Skills Hub
• Volunteering
• Student representation
• Skills Development Service
• Enterprise
• Student Senate
• Jobshop.

You can expect us to communicate with you in an honest, open, accurate and timely manner, and to deal sensitively and professionally with any concerns.

We'll communicate programme, module and assessment information clearly to you and make sure it adheres to consumer protection law, as set out by the Competition and Markets Authority.

We'll make it clear to applicants where additional costs may be required to fulfil your course. Additional costs are stated on our course pages under the tuition fees section and are also specified to applicants in your PDF offer letter.

Extenuating circumstances

You are expected to tell us when there are circumstances that may impact on your studies, so that we can provide support and help where necessary.

You should make sure that you are familiar with our processes for reporting extenuating circumstances and understand the possible outcomes of a successful application under the Extenuating Circumstances Procedure for undergraduate and postgraduate taught students.

There is a separate Extenuating Circumstances Procedure for postgraduate research students.

Additional support if you have a disability or long-term health condition

If you have a disability or long-term health condition, you may be entitled to additional support or reasonable adjustments to a programme of study, subject to certain criteria being met. Advice is available from our Disability and Dyslexia Service.

Exceptional circumstances

If, in exceptional circumstances (such as during a University closure due to snow, a pandemic or a period of industrial action), we are unable to deliver what has been advertised, we will seek to minimise the impact on your learning experience, by making sure appropriate adjustments are made to programme delivery and assessment.

In such circumstances, we will make sure there is timely and clear communication. This is clearly stated in the Academic Regulations under its Variation of Arrangements section. Our Academic Regulations are reviewed throughout the year, and changes are communicated to you via the intranet and other channels.

Keep informed

In order to be well informed, you are expected to pay attention to our communication, in particular to newsletters, emails and relevant webpages.

Email is one of the core ways we communicate with students. You should check your @cardiff.ac.uk email address regularly.

Get support and advice

We work together to give you the best possible experience at our university. If your experience fails to meet your expectations, we have established processes to deal with your concerns. Support is available from our Student Support and Wellbeing service and also through the Students’ Union Student Advice service, which is a free, impartial service independent from the university.

Making a complaint

We recognise that from time to time you may be dissatisfied and may wish to make a complaint to us. We take all complaints seriously. You are expected to raise a concern at the earliest opportunity and within 28 days of a concern arising.

Concerns must be raised under the Student Complaints Procedure. A complaint may be submitted if you feel you have suffered:

• a detriment, dissatisfaction or disadvantage due to alleged actions of a member or staff or student
• irregularities in the delivery of a programme
• provision of supervision
• issues relating to placement
• concerns about the quality of services, facilities or learning resources.

You can seek help and guidance on the complaints process, and all our procedures, from the Students’ Union's independent Student Advice service.

Whenever possible, we aim to resolve complaints at the earliest opportunity. You have the opportunity to escalate concerns and seek a review of the outcome. We aim to complete complaint cases within 90 days.

If you remain dissatisfied at the end of our internal processes, you can make a complaint to the Office of the Independent Adjudicator.