Ocular Pharmacology (10409.2)

Required texts

Recommended:
Bartlett JD, Jaanus SD. Clinical Ocular Pharmacology (5th Ed). Butterworth-Heinemann; 2007. ISBN: 9780750675765

Optional:
Ohia S, Sharif N, editors. Handbook of basic and clinical ocular pharmacology and therapeutics. Academic Press; 2022. ISBN: 9780128192917

Submission of assessment items

Extensions & Late submissions

Contract cheating

Contract cheating (academic outsourcing/ ghost-writing) is a form of academic misconduct in which students submit written or creative work, which has been drafted or produced by someone else and claim authorship for it. It includes (but is not limited to) using a third party, artificial intelligence, offering their services for commercial or other benefits, to complete (either partially or fully) an assignment or other assessment items on behalf of the student.  

You are at risk of contract cheating if you ask someone (including artificial intelligence) to:

• Complete an assignment for you
• Substantially edit your assignment
• Do your university work for you, with or without compensation
• Check test or quiz answers
• Sit a test or quiz for you
• Provide someone with your UC login details
• Use someone's work as your own

You may also be at risk of contract cheating if you provide information to people or organisations outside UC, such as:

• Assignment questions and briefs
• Lecture notes
• Marking rubrics and marking guides

UC considers contract cheating serious misconduct, which may attract suspension or exclusion from the university. Furthermore, we, as your education provider, have mandatory reporting responsibilities under National Law. We are required to notify the Australian Health Practitioners Regulation Agency (AHPRA) if we believe that a registered health practitioner (including those with student registration) has behaved in a way that constitutes notifiable conduct including significant deviation from accepted professional standards.  Contract cheating may also result in UC submitting a mandatory notification to AHPRA.

You can learn more about contract cheating in the Academic Integrity Module, which is a compulsory module that provides information about a range of issues including plagiarism and contract cheating. UC provides a range of services to support student learning - further information regarding Study Skills, Studiosity and Medical & Counselling services are available on your unit's Canvas site.

Artificial intelligence

Students are not permitted to use generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) in assessments for this unit, except for Studiosity Writing Feedback Plus.

GenAI may only be used in authorised ways when completing assessments at UC. This means that GenAI can only be used for an assessment when:

1. the Unit Convener has authorised GenAI use for that assessment
2. the student uses GenAI in the way that the assessment instructions allow
3. the student fully acknowledges their use of GenAI, with proper citations, references and a GenAI Acknowledgement Statement in line with the assessment instructions

Where the assessment instructions do not specifically state that GenAI may be used and how, then its use is not permitted for that assessment. Students must still provide the required GenAI Acknowledgement Statement to indicate whether GenAI has or has not been used in the preparation of the assessment. If unsure, students should seek advice from the Unit Convener.

The GenAI for Students Library Guide provides further information, including how to reference GenAI.

Special assessment requirements

Practical Coursework and Assessments

In order to pass 10409 Ocular Pharmacology, students must:

• Achieve a final aggregate (overall) mark of 50% or higher

If an answer provided by a student is likely to cause patient harm, contradictory in nature or is inappropriate to the question, the student may have marks deducted to, but not less than a zero grade for the entire assessment item.

Students are required to cooperate in (laboratory classes, workshops or remediation sessions) where students may be asked to practice optometry skills on each other; the amount of participation in these roles should be decided by students but must ensure that no student has a lesser or greater contribution than the others within the group. By both conducting the clinical procedures and participating in the tests, you will gain an insight and empathy into the issues associated with testing visual function, both from the point of view of both an optometrist and patient. 

As stated earlier, this course aims to develop your professional and communication skills in preparation for your journey towards being a health professional. During classes and placements, you will be required to demonstrate the ability to work collaboratively as part of a team, negotiate, and resolve conflict. Any action or omission that affects the safety of your patient or peers or is deemed disrespectful to your patients, fellow students or the teaching staff can result in failure of a patient assessment task regardless of the aggregate mark for the assessment, and can also result in student misconduct. Virtual classes have additional requirements where you will further develop communication skills in the virtual environment. While in a virtual environment, students are required to present themselves and communicate with peers, staff and invited speakers in a professional way. Hence the default for all virtual classes is for all student web cameras to be turned on during virtual classes. Instructors may require students to interact either verbally, through polls or the shared chat function. Students who do not participate in this way will be marked as absent for the class. Students who need guidance on expected behaviors and participation may consult with the Unit Convener and/or Study Skills. Instructors may request that cameras are turned off under certain circumstances.

Supplementary assessment

This unit is NOT in the final semester of the course, and a supplementary assessment is NOT available.

Students must apply academic integrity in their learning and research activities at UC. This includes submitting authentic and original work for assessments and properly acknowledging any sources used.

Academic integrity involves the ethical, honest and responsible use, creation and sharing of information. It is critical to the quality of higher education. Our academic integrity values are honesty, trust, fairness, respect, responsibility and courage.

UC students have to complete the Academic Integrity Module annually to learn about academic integrity and to understand the consequences of academic integrity breaches (or academic misconduct).

UC uses various strategies and systems, including detection software, to identify potential breaches of academic integrity. Suspected breaches may be investigated, and action can be taken when misconduct is found to have occurred.

Information is provided in the Academic Integrity Policy, Academic Integrity Procedure, and University of Canberra (Student Conduct) Rules 2023. For further advice, visit Study Skills.

Inclusion and engagement

If you have a Reasonable Adjustment Plan (RAP) that you wish to apply to your studies, it is your responsibility to communicate with your Unit Convener in writing at least 7 days before your in-class assessment is due. Please attach your RAP with your request.

Participation requirements

This unit contains participatory elements which are vital to the Optometry Board of Australia entry-level competencies for optometrists
https://www.optometry.org.au/wp-content/uploads/Professional_support/Guidelines/Final_Entry-level-Competency-Standard-for-Optometry-2022.pdf.

Except in the case of extenuating circumstances, 100% attendance is expected at all lectures, and 100% participation is expected in all laboratories and tutorials. Please note that not all learning material covered in lectures, e.g. worked examples of problems or discussion in small groups, will be captured by the lecture recording software. Students are expected to attend for the entire time scheduled for laboratories. Students who are late by more than 15 minutes without an adequate documented reason will be regarded as absent; students who leave before the end, unless all assigned work has been completed to the satisfaction of the lecturer or tutor, will be regarded as absent from the session. It is expected that students unable to fulfil these participation requirements will inform the Unit Convener as soon as practical, by telephone or email. Failure to adhere to these requirements may result in failure of the associated assessment piece (e.g. if you do not attend a laboratory session, the associated laboratory report will not be marked as the laboratory report requires you to include data that you have been involved collecting).

For inability to attend a scheduled laboratory session, an 'Absence from Laboratory' form (available on UCLearn Canvas) with supporting documentation must be submitted to the Unit Convener; students may be required to attend an additional laboratory session to complete the required tasks or complete other designated tasks in place of an additional laboratory session at the discretion of the Unit Convener but this may not be possible due to time and space constraints. Consideration will be given for illness; evidence such as a medical certificate will be required. The final decision will be at the discretion of the Unit Convener. 

Currently, there are no mandates on use of personal protective equipment but if any mandates are reinstated within the University, these will need to be followed. If students are unwilling to follow University directives, they will not be permitted to enter and participate in the laboratory session. As this information may change, please review CANVAS announcements regularly.

Contact details for the Unit Convener and the Student Centre are given in Section 1.

Required IT skills

The use of UCLearn Canvas, library searching skills for appropriate references, and word and data processing (Microsoft Office Suite) skills are necessary for this unit.

In-unit costs

There are no additional in-unit costs.

Work placement, internships or practicums

None

Additional information

Pursuant to the Health Practitioner Regulation National Law Act 2009, optometry practitioners (registered optometrists) and education providers have an obligation to report 'notifiable conduct', to the Optometry Board of Australia in order to prevent the public being placed at risk of harm.

Education providers are also required, under s.143 of the National Law, to make mandatory notifications in relation to students, if the provider reasonable believes:

1. A student enrolled with the provider has an impairment that, in the course of the student undertaking clinical training, may place the public at substantial risk of harm; or
2. A student for whom the provider has arranged clinical training has an impairment that, in the course of the student undertaking the clinical training, may place the public at substantial risk of harm.

Practitioners are required to make a mandatory notification in relation to a student if the practitioner reasonably believes that a student has an impairment that, in the course of the student undertaking clinical training, may place the public at substantial risk of harm.

All concerns raised within the Discipline of Optometry or by clinical preceptors will be reviewed by the Discipline Lead and the Unit Convener before any reporting action is taken.

These professional obligations are taken seriously by staff and the University. Students should be aware of their obligations under student registration.

For further information, please refer to: https://www.optometryboard.gov.au/policies-codes-guidelines/guidelines-for-mandatory-notifications.aspx

• Semester 2, 2025, On-campus, UC - Canberra, Bruce (227140)
• Semester 2, 2024, On-campus, UC - Canberra, Bruce (221865)