The World Cup is over and the sun keeps shining, so what does Summer26 look like for you? Maybe a beach break or being with family over the school holidays or working or … maybe it’s rising to the challenge of resubmitting assignments and/or retaking exams in August.

Resubmission: an opportunity

Many of us who have been through the process of needing to bounce back after an experience of not hitting the mark, often find that we learn a lot through the process. Resubmission requires reflecting on what we need to do to achieve our goals. Through reflection, we learn to recognise our strengths and acknowledge areas of challenge. We get to practise developing our learning and skills in ways that will not only enhance the particular resubmitted assignment, but also enhance our learning development for future assessments.

In this blog we share reminders of general support available over the summer and signpost to services and resources to assist with the resubmission experience.

Time management: a key to success

Time management is key to success in our academic, personal and professional lives. Work out how much time you have before your deadline and what you need to do to meet the deadline. You could ask/prompt Microsoft Co-Pilot to help create a plan with mini deadlines and tasks.

Visit our Time Management page for tips & strategies, including Time Management resource and previous blog posts, such as Getting stuff done when you don’t want to do stuff; Understanding Procrastination

Feedback: feedforward

Take time to read over feedback and check your understanding of what you need to do to pass your assessments. If you’re not sure what something means, check in with tutors for clarification. The resources linked below will help to process and apply feedback:

skills@cumbria webpage: Working with feedback resources & guides

Blog post: Making feedback work for you

Be an excellent rewriter

Do you find it easier to review other people’s writing rather than your own? Often this is because we are too close to our own work to be able to view it objectively: we can’t see the wood for the trees, as the saying goes. Resubmission can position us as our own critical friends. The combination of elapsed time and distance from the original deadline and feedback from our tutors, helps to develop our abilities to view our writing from a more critical distance, and learn how to improve it.

Many students find that this experience doesn’t just improve their writing for the particular assignments they need to resubmit, but also helps them become better rewriters for future assignments. Check out the Quick Guide to Academic Writing (PDF) which provides an overview of key considerations for effective academic writing. The Writing at University page offers a comprehensive guide to writing development.

Remember the skills@cumbria 500 word feedback service is available throughout the summer. For more details, visit our Need More Help page.

Visit our skills@cumbria online resources for more library, academic and digital skills resources.

Referencing academic sources

Citing and referencing more accurately are quick ways to potentially pick up more marks. Referencing and Avoiding Plagiarism webpage includes various Quick Guides, as well as tutorials, FAQs and more on all aspects of referencing.

As well as being accurate with your citation and reference formatting, your tutor’s feedback might advise that you need to find, analyse and critically evaluate more quality, academic sources. See the Finding Information, Reading, and Being Critical webpages for guidance on searching for and critically engaging with academic sources.

Wellbeing

University of Cumbria students share tips for Wellbeing and Studying

Feeling a bit overwhelmed? Do One Thing

Visit the Mental Health and Wellbeing homepage for links to further services and resources.

Plan some quality time out from study and work to rejuvenate your mind, body and soul.

You’re not on your own

See our Need More Help page for information about ways we work alongside students to support your academic work, including the skills@cumbria email and feedback service.

Library and academic advisors from skills@cumbria and specialist learning advisors from disability services are available for appointments throughout the summer: book a 1 to 1 appointment.

Visit the Support over Summer page for links to other services and resources.

However and wherever you are spending your summer, use the Student Enquiry Point to reach out to any student support teams.

Potentially positive side effects of resubmission

Working through challenging experiences like resubmission can help us to increase our capacity for coping with difficult situations. Resubmission can provide an opportunity to grow our tolerance and resilience which help us to better navigate stressful and demanding events in the future. We wish you well on your resubmission journey and here’s to coming out the other side stronger personally, professionally, and academically, ready to face next year’s challenges.