On being an external examiner

Abstract

This article presents some of the findings from an interview survey of external examiners of undergraduate courses in the UK carried out in 2004. It examines the reasons why academics are willing to take on and continue with this work, despite the other demands on their time and higher institutional priorities such as their own teaching and research. It finds that external examiners often receive little or no support from their own institution for such activity. It concludes that they value the role for reasons of reciprocity and information or intelligence gathering, that they are resistant to attempts to make it more formal in function, and that they generally oppose attempts to impose a national system of training.