Pakistani student Rehab Asad Shaikh has sued the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE), claiming that an error in her graduation marks cost her the chance to pursue an MPhil at the University of Cambridge.
Rehab, originally from Khairpur Gambat in Sindh, completed her undergraduate degree in Policy Studies at LSE in 2023.
That same year, due to a UK-wide Marking and Assessment Boycott, her dissertation was assessed by a single marker instead of the usual double-marking process, and she was awarded a mark of 57.
Believing this process disadvantaged her compared to other students, Rehab pursued every available avenue, internal appeals, complaints procedures, and eventually an escalation to the Office of the Independent Adjudicator (OIA), the external body that reviews complaints about UK higher education providers.
After more than two years, LSE agreed to re-mark her dissertation. The result was dramatic: her mark increased from 57 to 72, a 15-point difference.
The lower mark, she says, prevented her from pursuing an MPhil at Cambridge, leading her to enroll in a Master’s program in Modern South Asian Studies at Oxford University instead.
Today, she holds a senior position in a UK government ministry and maintains that her career trajectory could have been different if the LSE grading error had not occurred.
