UNIVERSITY bosses have apologised to a student for mishandling a complaint about lost teaching hours. 

Chiefs at the University of Glasgow were ordered to say sorry after the learner, known only as Ms C, raised her concerns with a watchdog. 

She told the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman industrial action on campus last year had a significant impact on her education, with a number of paid for classes cancelled. 

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However, while it was found the university had failed to handle her original complaint “reasonably”, a string of the postgraduate student’s accusations were dismissed by the watchdog. 

This included claims that staff had not offered alternatives in lieu of the lost lessons. 

In a report published by the ombudsman, investigators wrote: “We found that the university had taken appropriate steps to minimise the academic impact of the industrial action by giving students advance notice of the industrial action and ensuring that students would only be assessed on work that they had an opportunity to cover in the course of their studies.

“During the semester affected by the industrial action, Ms C was taking three courses. 

“These courses were formal components of Ms C’s postgraduate programme. 

“Three of Ms C’s classes were cancelled due to the industrial action across two of the 
courses. 

“Regarding two of the classes, the university offered to discuss course material with Ms C on a one-to-one basis and offered to give feedback on an essay regarding a particular topic. 

“Regarding the third class, no steps were taken by the university to make up for the lost teaching hours. 

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“Given that the university made attempts to make up for the teaching hours lost for two out of the three classes cancelled, on balance, we did not consider the university had acted unreasonably.” 

A University of Glasgow spokesman said: “We are glad the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman found the university had taken appropriate steps to minimise the academic impact of the industrial action and we have apologised to Ms C for the delay in correspondence.”