Agenda and Papers - University of Edinburgh

Senate Quality Assurance Committee – 25 May 2011
Internal subject review – core process elements
For the University’s internal subject review process to provide a robust assurance of
the quality of its provision, it is essential that core elements of the process are
common across Teaching Programme Review (TPR) and Postgraduate Programme
Review (PPR). This paper confirms these elements, some of which are already
being introduced, and proposes clear responsibility for specific aspects of the
process for PPR between the University Quality Unit and College Offices.
Standard process elements:
• Standard University remit. Guidance is being developed which will provide
examples under each remit item appropriate to the type of review (TPR or
PPR)
• Remit meeting convened by Director of Academic Standards and Quality
Assurance and attended by the Dean/Associate Dean/Director of Quality
Assurance and for PPR the Postgraduate Dean. The meeting receives
proposals for inclusion in the review remit from the area under review,
including items proposed by students, the School, College and University,
and agrees the remit for the review.
• Student engagement with the review, through advance information and
encouragement to contribute via staff-student liaison committees, subjectspecific
societies and other discipline-specific fora. Student involvement in
the preparation of the Analytical Report is encouraged.
• An Analytical Report prepared by the subject area/School. This document
should be reflective, structured according to the headings of the standard
remit and include reflection on the subject-specific remit items.
• Standard core supporting documentation. The detail of this standard content
is currently being taken forward, including the definition of standard statistical
reports for PPR.
• Internal briefing meeting prior to the review visit. This meeting is held 2-3
weeks before the review visit for the internal members of the review team, the
DASQA and Dean/Associate Dean/Director of Quality Assurance. The
purpose is to scrutinise the outline of the review visit in relation to its coverage
of the University and subject-specific remit, and to discuss lines of enquiry
raised by the review documentation.
• Explicit timescales for forwarding review recommendations to the subject
area/School and others responsible for action, and for annual reporting of
action on the recommendations in School’s annual quality assurance report.
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