Upper Piddlington · Established 978 (ish)Porters’ Lodge · Prospective students
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King Ethelred’s
College of Engineering
Persevera Etelred
Registry

Term dates & regulations

When to be here, and what not to bring.

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Home / Term dates and regulations
Gowned students craning to read a cloister noticeboard thick with overlapping notices, while a porter pins another on top
Registry

Term dates for 2026 to 2027

Published on the cloister noticeboard and, as a courtesy to those who cannot get near it, here.

TermDatesNotes
MichaelmasMonday 5 October to Friday 4 December 2026Begins with the Annual Inspection of the Boilers, held since 1841. Ends when the heating is understood.
CandlemasMonday 11 January to Friday 12 March 2027The quadrangle reaches its annual minimum. Lectures continue, in coats.
Trinity (ish)Monday 19 April to Friday 18 June 2027Examinations. The lawn is at its best and may be looked at.
The Long VacationFrom 19 June 2027The Fellowship disperses to several highly confidential sheds.

The College has kept three terms since 978 (ish). The names have changed more often than the heating.

Statutes and regulations

Twelve regulations, each with a reason the College would rather not go into.

Regulations

Examinations

  1. Candidates shall surrender at the door any item likely to assist them unfairly or to alarm the invigilator. In recent years these have included a slide rule of unusual length, a catapult, a pocket kettle and a ferret.
  2. The ferret was returned at the end of the examination. It had not assisted.
  3. Tea is served at the one-hour mark. A candidate who is still on Section C when the trolley arrives should consider what that implies.
  4. All answers are to be given with their units. An answer without units is a number, and the College has a Library for those.
Regulations

Conduct

  1. No member of the College shall walk, dig, build or hold a trial on the Fellows’ Lawn without the permission of the Clerk of Works. Permission was last given in 1643 and the circumstances were exceptional.
  2. Students shall not climb the wind-tunnel intake, feed the Fellows, or ask the Thermodynamics Department whether entropy is “just vibes”.
  3. Trebuchets are to be pointed away from the Library. This regulation was added in Michaelmas 2026 and the reason is catalogued.
  4. Every conclusion is to be tested by applying it to the person who reached it.
Regulations

Academic dress and property

  1. Gowns are worn at lectures, at dinner and, in the Candlemas term, in bed.
  2. Anything left in the Library at closing becomes part of the collection.
  3. A student requiring a connector of any kind should ask in the workshop. A student requiring Gerald should not expect one.
  4. The Senior Common Room’s biscuit tins are not structural members, and are not to be used as such again.
Students filing into the examination hall past a table where each surrenders an item: a slide rule, a catapult, a kettle and a ferret in a basket
Regulation 1

Items surrendered at the door

The Proctor keeps a book. The ferret appears in it once, under “instruments, other”, with the note that it was returned in good order and had attempted nothing.

See a specimen admissions paper →

Important: King Ethelred’s College is invented, and so is its calendar, its regulations and the ferret. The papers this page links to are real in one respect only: their figures and references.
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