Hundreds of students will "graduate" next week without knowing their marks.

The annual ceremonies will take place at the Brighton Centre from Monday to Friday next week but many of those wearing caps and gowns will not know when they might get their qualification.

Sussex University lecturers are boycotting exam marking and assessments as part of their ongoing industrial action in a row over pay.

The university website says it cannot confirm whether a student has failed or passed but where possible it is trying to give "interim awards".

A lack of a degree classification could be problematic for students trying to find jobs, especially those who hold a conditional offer of graduate employment.  

The university said it also cannot confirm resit dates for students who fail until the boycott is over and the marks have been fully released. The typical resit period would be between Monday, August 7, and Saturday, August 19. 

Exceptional circumstances claims also cannot be applied to modules that have not yet been marked. This leaves students completely in the dark over their results. 

The university website says students will receive the certificate for their awards by post once marks have been validated. 

Sussex Students’ union said the situation was stressful for students. It called on the university to "end the punitive pay deductions" facing University and College Union (UCU) lecturers "to ensure that students' work is marked when the dispute ends".

The students' union said members would benefit from an extension of the complaints period for any of those affected by the boycott. The period ended on Friday. 

A university spokeswoman said: “We know this has been a challenging time for many students and, while this is a national issue that has to be resolved at a national level, we are doing everything we can to ensure outstanding marking gets completed as soon as possible, while maintaining academic standards.   

“We are working with national bodies to look at how we can work with UCU to end the boycott, which is affecting 146 universities across the country.”