Business Rules - Education

Six core rules governing the behaviour of the education system.

BR-01 - Prerequisite verification before exam booking

Context: Student attempts to book an exam session for module B, which has module A as a prerequisite.

Rule: The system must verify that the student has a passed Assessment for all prerequisite modules. If any prerequisite is unsatisfied, the booking is rejected with an explanatory message.

Exception: The academic committee may grant an explicit waiver (stored as a PrerequisiteWaiver).

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BR-02 - Study plan approval

Context: Student submits their study plan for the academic year.

Rule: The plan must be validated against: (a) all modules must belong to the student's course or be permitted electives; (b) the total ECTS must be within the regulatory range; (c) there must be no timetable conflicts. The plan's approved flag is set to true only after explicit approval.

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BR-03 - Degree classification calculation

Context: Student has completed all required assessments and applies to graduate.

Rule: The degree classification is calculated from the credit-weighted average of module grades, converted to the applicable scale (e.g. UK degree classes: First ≥ 70%, 2:1 ≥ 60%, 2:2 ≥ 50%). Bonus points may be awarded for: (a) exceptional dissertation assessment, (b) graduating within the standard duration. The final classification is determined by the graduation board.

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BR-04 - Grade rejection and re-sitting

Context: Student has received a passing grade but wishes to reject it.

Rule: The student may reject the grade within 5 working days of publication, provided it has not yet been officially recorded (recorded_at IS NULL). After recording, the grade is final. Rejection does not count as an "attempt" for the purposes of any resit limits.

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BR-05 - Erasmus credit recognition

Context: Student returns from a study abroad period and submits the Transcript of Records.

Rule: Recognition is based on semantic matching between the foreign module and the home institution's catalogue. Acceptance criteria: (a) content similarity ≥ 70%; (b) ECTS delta ≤ 20% (e.g. 6 ECTS abroad for 8 ECTS at home is acceptable). The grade is converted from the foreign scale to the home scale using the institution's conversion table.

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BR-06 - Access to SEN / disability data

Context: Request to access the has_sen and has_disability fields of a student record.

Rule: Only the following roles may read these attributes: SEN_COORDINATOR, DISABILITY_COORDINATOR, STUDENT_SELF. Teaching staff see only the anonymous flag "reasonable adjustments required: yes/no" - not the diagnostic detail. Every access is logged in audit_log with timestamp, userId, and operation.

Legal basis: UK Equality Act 2010, SEND Code of Practice 2015; US IDEA 2004, Section 504; GDPR Art. 9 (health data); FERPA (US education records).