Final Exam

A five-station practical examination covering hygiene, fashion, small talk, reading the room and daily survival

The five stations#

You attend all five stations once each during the session, in any order. The time given for each station is suggested pacing within the fixed 2 hour 50 minute session — how you divide your own time between stations, and which you attend first, is up to you, not a strict per-station cutoff. The exception is Station 3, where the examiner enforces the ten-minute mark directly, since no examiner can spend unlimited time with one candidate.

The exam doesn’t examine every week’s content. Weeks 5 and 9 are left out because their evidence is inherently extended-duration or self-reported — 15 minutes outdoors, an opening message sent into the world — and neither compresses into a ten-minute station without becoming fake. The weeks that are kept (1–4, 6–8, 10–12) are kept for the opposite reason: each one reduces to a live, observable action worth re-checking under real-time pressure, regardless of whether it was already assessed elsewhere.

1. Station 1: Hygiene and Health (suggested 10 minutes). A rapid check of your hygiene and sleep schedules against what you actually ran this semester, plus a hobby or interest you engage in.
2. Station 2: Fashion (suggested 10 minutes). Assemble one outfit for an occasion given to you on the day, from a rack of provided items.
3. Station 3: Small Talk (10 minutes). Hold a conversation with an examiner playing a stranger at a low-stakes social event. The examiner may leave early if the conversation stalls past recovery, and will leave at the ten-minute mark regardless.
4. Station 4: Reading the Room (suggested 10 minutes). Diagnose a friend-group or workplace scenario that plays out in front of you, and propose a reason and a fix in the same shape as Week 8’s incident-report format: what was agreed, what actually happened, and the actual reason.
5. Station 5: Daily Survival (suggested 2 hours 10 minutes). Plan a complete, edible meal from a provided pantry, on a budget stated at the door, then cook it within the time available; examiners mark by observation as it happens.

Total session time is 2 hours 50 minutes, fixed regardless of how you pace the individual stations, of which the four short stations combined are worth more than double the long cooking station — duration is not difficulty.

Exam conditions#

The exam venue is divided into five designated station areas; you walk between them yourself as you move from one station to the next. Stations may be completed in any order.

The only material permitted is a black or blue pen. No phones, no smartwatches, no other electronic devices, and no calculators — the exam is closed book throughout. Materials provided at a station — the outfit rack at Station 2, the pantry at Station 5 — do not count against this restriction.

No talking is permitted at any station, with one exception: Station 3 makes talking compulsory, and a silent conversation fails the station on its own terms.

An official exam answer booklet is issued for your written answers.

Breaking any of the above is academic misconduct.

How each band reads#

Each station is marked on its own rubric against the weights above. Read together, the five stations describe one overall band:

• HD — every station is completed with the target skill actively demonstrated, not just attempted, and the two stations most reliant on live judgement (Small Talk, Reading the Room) hold up under real time pressure.
• D — every station is completed and the target skill is demonstrated in most of them; one station falls back to a lower band under time pressure.
• C — every station is attempted, but two or more stations show only partial evidence of the target skill.
• P — most stations are attempted, but coverage is thin enough that the session reads as five separate near-misses rather than five demonstrated skills.
• N — one or more stations are not attempted or fail on their own stated terms (the meal isn’t edible, the conversation stalls before the ten-minute mark).

Practice paper#

An archived past paper from the Semester 1, 2026 sitting of this exam is available for revision: the archived practice paper.

FAQ#

Can I bring my own kitchen knife to Station 5?#

No. The only material you bring is a black or blue pen — everything at Station 5, cookware and pantry included, is provided at the station. Bringing your own equipment is a materials-restriction breach, not a head start.

If I finish Station 1 early, can I use the leftover time on Station 5?#

Yes. The suggested durations are pacing guidance, not per-station cutoffs — the only fixed number is the 2 hour 50 minute total, so finishing a station early just leaves you more of that total for whatever comes next. Station 3 is the one exception: its ten-minute limit is enforced directly by the examiner, not by your own pacing.