The University uses ‘blind marking’ (tutors do not know whose assignment they are looking at) to ensure that your assignments are marked without bias.
To ensure the anonymity of your assignment you will need to leave out or remove any information that identifies you, including…
- Assignment content. Do not put your name anywhere on your assignment document.
- Assignment file name. Do not include your name as part of the file name. We recommend the following convention:
CourseTitle_AssignmentNumber.docx
So for example, your file for assignment two in your art history course might be named:
ModernArt_Assignment2.docx
It doesn’t matter if everyone uses the same file name, as our assignment handling system will append a unique participant number to each file which will distinguish it from the others.
- Document properties. Many software programs will store the name of the author of the document in the document properties fields. This can easily be removed. See the section below for more details.
How to anonymise a Word document (PC)
‘Document properties’ is the information that your software program stores with each file, and includes pre-filled information such as the author of the document.
To remove the pre-filled author information from a Word document and ensure your anonymity:
- Find the document on your computer, do not open it, but right click on the file name
- Choose Properties from the menu
- Click on the Details tab
- Click the link at the bottom of the tab titled Remove properties and personal information
- Click the radio button at the top, to select Remove the following properties from this file
- Click to tick the Authors and Last saved by boxes
- Click OK, and OK again to exit.
This will ensure that your marker cannot see who has submitted this assignment.
How to anonymise a Word document (Mac)
Please note these instructions relate to Word for Mac version 16.16.23
In Word, press Review
- Protect
- Protect document
- Under Privacy tick Remove personal information from file on save
- Click OK.
How to anonymise a Pages document before converting to Word
We currently do not accept documents saved in .pages format. If you are a Mac user, you can use Pages to produce your written work but you will need to convert the file from .pages to .docx.
Before you convert your Pages document you can make your work anonymous by following these steps.
- With your Pages document open, go to Preferences. (On an iPad tap on the
icon). - Choose General. (On an iPad choose Settings)
- Go to Author Field. (On an iPad go to Author Name)
- In the Author Name box type ‘anonymous’.
You can follow instructions on how to convert your .pages document to an accepted format.
Finally, when you submit your file, change the Author field from your name to: ‘Anonymous’.