Safe participation. Equivalent evidence.

No student is required to prepare, purchase, handle, or consume food to meet a course learning outcome.

These rules apply to every session, every test station, and every piece of graded work. Where an assessment brief and this page disagree, this page governs; tell a member of staff so the brief can be corrected.

Three equivalent routes

Every practical activity in the course can be completed by any one of three routes.

  1. Physical specimen

    Real, low-cost materials, loaded and observed. Nothing is eaten.

    ProvesThat you can set up a physical test, load it, and record what happened.

  2. Non-food analogue

    Foam, sponge, cardboard, clay, textile or another suitable material standing in for the one under test.

    ProvesThat you can isolate the variable and measure it, in a material you can handle comfortably.

  3. Supplied evidence

    Course-provided photographs, measurements, video frames, or a failure-case pack.

    ProvesThat you can read a record you did not produce and argue from it.

Same learning outcome / same marking criteriaAll three routes are equivalent for assessment.

In every marking scheme in the course the three have the same status: Equivalent. You cannot lose marks for choosing an alternative to direct food handling, and you are not asked to justify the choice.

Choose a participation route

  1. Can you safely and comfortably use a physical specimen?

  2. Physical route available.

  3. Choose a non-food analogue or supplied-evidence pack.

  4. No diagnosis or disclosure is required, at any point, by anyone.

Do not confuse participation method with academic quality.

The seven policies

  1. Food handling and consumptionTesting in this course is structural. Eating is not part of it.
  2. Allergies and sensory accessAn alternative route is available on request, and the request is the whole process.
  3. Cost and materialsNothing in the course is priced as a barrier to completing it.
  4. WasteMaterial used is material accounted for.
  5. Photography, privacy and consentEvidence records a specimen, not a person.
  6. Cultural and dietary respectThe course does not hold a single correct definition of a sandwich.
  7. Assessment fairnessWhat is marked is the test and the reasoning, not the food.

Food handling and consumption

Testing in this course is structural. Eating is not part of it.

  • You are never required to eat a specimen.
  • Tested food must not be presented to another person for consumption.
  • Shared workspaces are cleaned before and after physical testing.
  • Cutting activities use supplied pre-cut specimens, diagrams, or supervised equipment. This holds in the week built around the cut, Week 9: Cutting Geometry, as it does everywhere else.
  • A structural result never overrides a food-safety requirement.

Allergies and sensory access

An alternative route is available on request, and the request is the whole process.

  • You do not need to disclose a medical diagnosis in order to select an alternative pathway.
  • Non-food materials and supplied evidence are always accepted.
  • No activity depends exclusively on smell, taste, touch, colour perception, or fine motor control.
  • Alternative evidence formats assess the same learning outcome without penalty.

Cost and materials

Nothing in the course is priced as a barrier to completing it.

  • No assessment may require expensive or specialist ingredients.
  • Purchasing premium food earns no marks.
  • Required physical materials are supplied, or are replaceable with a common non-food analogue.
  • A test uses the smallest specimen capable of answering the question.

Waste

Material used is material accounted for.

  • A test protocol justifies the amount of material it uses.
  • Tested food must not later be represented as safe to consume.
  • Non-food models are preferred when repeated destructive testing is required.
  • Waste reduction is treated as a design constraint, not as a taste or sustainability bonus mark.

Evidence records a specimen, not a person.

  • You may photograph your own specimens or any supplied case.
  • Identifiable people and private domestic spaces require consent.
  • No assessment requires photographing workers or customers without permission.
  • Supplied evidence remains available whenever field photography is impractical.

Cultural and dietary respect

The course does not hold a single correct definition of a sandwich, and does not ask you to adopt one.

  • No universal or culturally neutral definition of a sandwich is enforced.
  • A classification argument states its criteria rather than dismissing an unfamiliar food form. This is the work of Week 1: What Counts as a Sandwich?.
  • Dietary practice is never treated as a structural defect.
  • You are assessed on reasoning and evidence, not on ingredient choice.

Assessment fairness

What is marked is the test and the reasoning, not the food.

  • Taste, presentation, culinary skill, and consumption are excluded from marking. The assessment overview sets out what each piece of work is worth and how it is judged.
  • The physical, analogue, and supplied-evidence pathways are equivalent.
  • A specimen marked Failed may still receive strong marks when the test is well designed, documented, and interpreted.
  • Fabricated measurements and undocumented claims do not count as evidence.

Before you begin a test

Each week’s test station sets its own conditions, listed in the weeks index. These eight checks apply to all of them. Work through them before you load anything.

  • I know which of the three routes I am taking, and I know I do not have to explain why.
  • I can state the learning outcome this test is evidence for.
  • I can state the one variable the test changes, and the observation that will record it.
  • I am using the smallest specimen that can answer the question.
  • Nothing in my protocol requires me, or anyone else, to taste or eat a specimen.
  • Any cutting uses a pre-cut specimen, a diagram, or supervised equipment, and the workspace is clean.
  • Any photograph I intend to take contains no identifiable person and no private domestic space without consent.
  • I know what happens to the material afterwards, and I will not offer tested food to anyone.

Contact course staff

Two people teach the course. Marisol Quaye is the convenor, reachable at marisol.quaye@slop.university for course-level questions, with feedback on work handled in the weekly session. Idris Fenn is a tutor, reachable at idris.fenn@slop.university when a question cannot wait until the next session. Either of them can confirm an equivalent route for you, and neither will ask you why. Full entries for both are on the people page.

SLOP2895 / Semester 1 2027