All ANU undergraduate law students will be enrolled in an LLB(Hons) program as this degree program has been in place since 2015. This program delivers and assesses Honours-level research skills in all coursework, including both compulsory and elective courses. This means that a student enrolled in this program is eligible to be awarded a degree with Honours without needing to write a thesis. This path to Honours is also called embedded honours.
Students who wish to write a thesis in the LLB(Hons) program can enrol in the course LAWS4300 Supervised Research Paper. Students do not need to write a thesis in the LLB(Hons) program to be awarded a degree with Honours, however; you must complete LAWS4300 Supervised Research Paper in order to be considered for a University Medal.
Calculating your Honours grade in the LLB(Hons) program
Upon completion of the LLB(Hons) program, students are given an Honours grade. This grade is different from a GPA. Information about the ANU GPA and how it is calculated is found at: ANU Grade Point Average (GPA)
The LLB(Hons) grade is calculated using Weighted Average Mark (WAM).
Only eligible courses are used for this calculation. Eligible courses are those undertaken at the ANU College of Law and receive a grade and result. Students may have fewer ANU law courses if they have, for example, undertaken an exchange, cross institutional study, or transferred to the ANU after starting their law degree somewhere else. While courses studied elsewhere might count towards the completion of a law degree, as they do not have an ANU and receive a grade and result, they cannot be used in the Honours calculation.
The honours grade is calculated by adding together the results for all eligible courses, and then dividing by the total number of eligible courses (rounded up). This method is called WAM and is set out in the Policy: Student assessment (coursework).
ANU College of Law will apply a ‘discount rule’. The discount rule works in the following way;
- If you have studied 16 courses at the ANU law school, add the 16 marks together and divide by 16.
- If you have studied 17 courses at the ANU law school, discount the lowest mark and add the 16 highest marks together and divide by 16.
- If you have studied 18 courses at the ANU law school, discount the lowest two marks and add the 16 highest marks together and divide by 16.
- If you have studied 19 courses at the ANU law school, discount the lowest three marks and add the highest 16 marks together and divide by 16.
- If you have studied 20 courses (or more) at the ANU law school, discount the lowest four marks and add the marks for all the rest of the courses together and divide by the number of courses. This means that you can only discount a maximum of 4 course marks.
WAM will produce a number out of 100. This is used to calculate the law Honours grade.
- 80+ = H1 or First class Honours
- 70-79 = 2A or Second Class Honours Division A
- 60-69 = 2B or Second Class Honours Division B
- 50–59 = Third class Honours
- Below 50 = No Honours
Please note that for the purposes of Honours calculation, an N or an NCN grade is given 0 marks. Unless a 0 can be excluded according to the discount rules above, it is included in the WAM.
The numerical mark behind a CRS/CRN will not be used for the Honours calculation for 2020.
The numerical mark behind a CRS/CRN will be used for the Honours calculation for 2021.
Transferring students – from LLB to LLB (Hons)
Students enrolled in a law degree at the ANU prior to 2015, would have enrolled in an ‘LLB’ degree. With the introduction of the LLB (Hons) program in 2015, many students transferred from the LLB program into the ‘LLB (Hons)’ program. Students must have transferred to the newer program to receive honours. It did not happen automatically.
For transferring students, the calculation of the Honours grade is the same as for New Honours students. Regardless of the date of your transfer, ‘eligible courses’ include all those completed at the ANU College of Law for a mark on or after Semester One 2015.
As it is not possible to include the marks for courses before Semester One 2015, it is likely that transferring students will not have as many courses to ‘discount’.