FAQs on the STP Final Year Assessment for trainees

The STP Final Year Assessment is an essential part of your programme. You need to pass the assessment to complete the programme. You need to be available for all of the working days within the assessment sitting window. You will be assigned a specific day and time to attend your assessment within this window.

You will be assessed with other trainees in your specialty. Multiple trainees will complete the same circuit of stations at the same time, each starting at a different point in the circuit and moving sequentially between stations. We cannot accommodate requests for your assessment to be on a specific date, regardless of when you let us know.

You can find more information on mitigating circumstances which may impact your attendance at the assessment in the STP Final Year Assessment regulations as well as what will happen if you don’t attend the assessment.

Your assessment date and time will be on a working day within the assessment sitting window dates listed. We will aim to give you as much notice as possible of your assessment date and time. When we do have this information available, we will get in touch with you using your preferred email address, so please make sure you notify us if this changes.

In exceptional circumstances, your assessment time and date may need to be rescheduled within the assessment sitting window. If this happens, you will still be expected to be available to attend your assessment. We strongly recommend you do not book any events which cannot be changed within the assessment sitting window.

You can find more information about what will happen if you don’t attend the assessment and about mitigating circumstances which may impact your attendance at the assessment in the STP Final Year Assessment regulations.

The STP Final Year Assessment is an essential part of your programme. You cannot defer your assessment. The STP Final Year Assessment regulations provide more information if you experience circumstances that impact your ability to complete the assessment (mitigating circumstances) or your training (exceptional extenuating circumstances).

For trainees following the normal timelines for the programme who will sit in the summer of their final year, the STP Final Year Assessment is scheduled as near to the end of the programme as is practically possible. Successful completion of the assessment is required to complete the programme, which for most trainees will be in September. Scheduling the assessment in July ensures that we have enough time to provide the result of your assessment to you before you complete the programme. If you are unsuccessful in the STP Final Year Assessment this also gives you some time to review and plan for a resit while you are still on the programme.

You don’t need to have completed all of your work-based training or your MSc before you sit the assessment. Scenarios presented to you in the assessment will sample the curriculum so you should be prepared to respond to scenarios on any area from within your curriculum.

You don’t need to submit anything in advance of the assessment. Scenarios presented to you in the assessment will sample the curriculum so you should be prepared to respond to scenarios on any area in your curriculum.

There are some tasks you need to complete before you sit the assessment such as selecting a device and location to use for the assessment and completing a diagnostic test of the assessment platform. You can find out more about how to prepare for the event including the technical requirements by visiting the Preparing for the STP Final Year Assessment section.

The School does not provide a mock assessment. You can read more about what to expect in the assessment, including what the platform will look like in the assessment and how to prepare, by visiting the Preparing for the STP Final Year Assessment section.

Completing your work-based assessments will help you to prepare for the STP Final Year Assessment. Your work-based assessments will help you develop the skills and applied knowledge of your practice needed for the assessment and also provide experience of completing ‘in-person’ assessments where you are required to respond to scenarios and talk through your rationale for your actions.

We have designed the assessment to be as inclusive as possible and to minimise the need for reasonable adjustments. We have expanded on how we’ve done this in the answer to the FAQ ‘How has the assessment been designed to make the assessment experience as inclusive as possible?’

You can apply for a reasonable adjustment. The School’s Reasonable Adjustments Policy sets out the process and full scope of reasons for requesting a reasonable adjustment. Applications for a reasonable adjustment must be made within the timelines outlined by the policy to be considered.

You cannot have notes, books or other materials with you in the assessment. During the pre-assessment checks, you will need to show the space you are taking the assessment in using the camera on your device. There is more information available on preparing for the day of your assessment and the technical requirements for the device you will use.

In the assessment you will be asked to describe what you would do in typical scenarios that you may face as a newly-registered Clinical Scientist. The focus of the assessment is on how you would behave in that scenario and what you would do to manage it, to ensure you are safe, professional and ready to practise. You will be provided with all the information you need to provide a response to the scenario, in the pre-reading you are shown immediately before each station and you may re-visit this information throughout the station. It will be up to you to assess, analyse and apply this information to describe how you would manage the situation. The assessment does not simply focus on your recall of knowledge so having additional information available to you in the assessment will not be helpful to you. You can find out more about preparing to sit the assessment on the Preparing to sit the assessment page.

You may have 1 sheet of blank paper and a pen or pencil with you to make notes during the assessment. Your notes must remain confidential and be destroyed immediately after the assessment. You can read more about preparing for the day of your assessment on the Preparing for the day of your assessment page.

Once your pre-assessment checks have been completed, you must not logout. You must remain visible on the screen. You cannot turn your camera off or step away from the screen at any time during the assessment. Your activity is monitored during the assessment by a circuit administrator and you may be observed or recorded during the assessment.

You may have a ‘rest station’ included in your assessment circuit. This is a station where you will not be presented with a scenario and will not have to respond to any questions. You will be on your own in the assessment platform but you still cannot turn your camera off or step away from the screen.

Once you have logged into the assessment platform, you do not have to do anything to move from one station to another. The platform will provide you with the right pre-reading at the right time and move you into the right station with the assessor. You cannot get lost. There is more information about the assessment platform on the Preparing to use the platform page.

It is your responsibility to ensure you are prepared for the STP Final Year Assessment. If you have completed all of the preparatory steps outlined, we don’t anticipate you will experience any issues. We do, however, know that sometimes there can be issues which are outside your control. We’ll do our best to support you with these. We’ve outlined how you can prepare for the day of your assessment and what to do if you experience an issue on the Preparing for the day of your assessment.

As outlined in the STP Final Year Assessment regulations, we will endeavour to ensure assessors are independent and you are not assessed by your current or past Training Officer(s). For smaller specialties in particular, it may be the case that you will be assessed by someone from your specialty community that you already know, or someone who has been involved in your work-based training or MSc.

If you know your assessor, this is not an advantage or a disadvantage. The assessment uses a standardised mark scheme which means your assessor will be marking you based on your performance in this assessment alone and will not treat you any differently.

Sufficient time for ALL trainees to complete the pre-reading and to provide a response to the scenarios has been built into the time allowed. The stations have been designed to include more time than we expect most people to need to provide their response, based on reviewing all historic reasonable adjustments applications for previous STP assessments. We do not expect that any reasonable adjustment application for additional time will be necessary.

Prior to each assessment station you will need to read the scenario, and the questions presented to you onscreen during the pre-reading time. The pre-reading will be presented following best practices for language, colour, layout and font that will seek to make the content more accessible for everyone. You’ll have access to the pre-reading throughout the station if you want to revisit the information.

How long you have in each part of the assessment will be presented to you on screen. You will be able to see a timer which counts down to the end of each part of the station telling you how long you have left in that part of the assessment.

Minimal information will be provided to you verbally by the assessor. The scenarios and question are both available to you in written format throughout the station. No additional information or questions on the scenario are provided verbally. Your assessors may provide you with limited verbal cues in the station, for example, to inform you that you are approaching the end of your time in the station. This information will also be available on screen.

You will need to be visible on screen using your webcam during the assessment. You will also be able to see your assessor on screen in each station. You’ll be expected to act professionally on screen, but your presentation style won’t be marked, just the response you provide.

We have designed the assessment to be as inclusive as possible and to minimise the need for reasonable adjustments. We have expanded on how we’ve done this in the answer to the FAQ ‘How has the assessment been designed to make the assessment experience as inclusive as possible?’

You can apply for a reasonable adjustment. The School’s Reasonable Adjustments Policy sets out the process and full scope of reasons for requesting a reasonable adjustment. Applications for a reasonable adjustment must be made within the timelines outlined by the policy to be considered.

We have outlined the indicative timelines for receiving your results for each sitting of the assessment. We will endeavour to get your results to you as soon as possible while making sure due process is followed. We will send your results to your preferred email address, so please make sure you notify us if this changes.

If you are not successful at your 1st attempt, you will have an opportunity to resit the assessment. The regulations which guide resit opportunities are available in the STP Final Year Assessment regulations. If you need to resit, your programme is not extended, and your resit will be completed ‘off programme’. Your programme completion date will remain the same and you will need to complete all other elements of the programme as expected. Additional funding is not available for trainees who need to resit the assessment.

All attempts at the assessment are completed in the same format. Resit opportunities follow the same format as the 1st sit assessment. The regulations which guide resit opportunities are available in the STP Final Year Assessment regulations.