Quality Assurance And Curriculum Development Policy And Procedures¹

Mission Statement

As a College we set high standards for clinical, academic and professional excellence and our mission is to produce and develop professionally qualified practitioners of acupuncture, Chinese herbal medicine, nutrition and complementary medicine, educated to these standards.

To assist this we aim to provide an inspirational learning environment of a very high quality, with a range of highly motivated and professionally qualified staff, and we aim to base our work on shared values.

Quality Assurance Agency and the Quality Code

We use the Quality Code of the Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education (QAA) as the key reference point for quality and standards, alongside the educational standards of the professional bodies. We apply the Quality Code in designing and delivering our courses. It provides a starting point for setting, describing and assuring the academic standards of our awards and courses and the quality of the learning opportunities we provide. We also use it to design our respective policies for maintaining academic standards and quality.

Quality

Statement

In accordance with our approach to education, we are committed to standards of excellence in the teaching of both factual knowledge and technical skills, in the development of understanding and thinking skills. and in the development of well-rounded practitioners.

We aim to generate an atmosphere of energy and enthusiasm, which motivates and inspires students and staff alike.

Aims

• Our quality assurance process seeks to monitor data from a variety of sources as a basis of evidence of quality.
  
  
• From this data, to identify areas of weakness and to set targets for quality improvement.
  
  
• To involve staff, students and external advisors in a rigorous cycle of quality assurance.

Objectives

• Issues will be identified during the year both from student feedback (ad hoc, sessional and via student reps and Boards of Study) and identified directly by staff. These issues will be evaluated and acted on as soon as possible (some issues within two weeks, some following discussion at a Board of Study or Management Team meeting), with agreed actions and person(s) responsible for implementation being recorded in the action tracking Planner of the Board of Studies, Management Team or Academic Board, or for more substantive College-wide issues in the Quality Improvement Plan. Key issues and recurring themes will be collated and summarised by the end of June for the end of year evaluation.
  
  
• Annual student feedback forms will be completed by the end of June, with a target for minimum response rate of 60% or greater.
  
  
• Data gathered from all sources, together with our data and trends analysis, will be compiled and circulated by the Student Services Manager or Officer responsible for the course. Immediate issues which can be addressed quickly will be reported to staff in July. A full analysis of student feedback and inputs from staff, external examiners, and other sources will be presented to the Boards of Study at the beginning of the next academic year.
  
  
• During the academic year and in July on receipt of the summary of immediate issues, the course teaching teams will identify immediate changes to be implemented for the coming academic year. The Boards of Study will identify medium term changes to be implemented for the year after.
  
  
• The action plan and personal responsibility for actions for immediate changes will be agreed during the year and in the July discussions.
  
  
• Agreed actions to implement immediate changes will be completed by the end of July.
  
  
• The action plan for medium term changes at course level will be completed within four weeks of the autumn Boards of Study. Medium term College-wide changes will be recorded within four weeks of the autumn Academic Board meeting, in the Academic Board action tracker or Quality Improvement Plan.
  
  
• Personal responsibilities for medium term changes will be agreed by both parties at the autumn Boards of Study/Academic Board, or within four weeks of the Board meetings.
  
  
• The staff periodic review process will identify any staff development needs in relation to agreed personal responsibilities for actions.

Cycle of Quality Improvement

Quality improvement is considered as a continuous cycle consisting of three phases and six procedures. Some data input to the cycle is straightforward (e.g. some student or staff feedback during the year) and actions can be agreed and assigned within days or weeks. There is also an annual cycle gathering data from a wider range of sources in order to evaluate courses and the College as a whole and determine actions.

The first phase of the cycle is data manipulation consisting of two procedures, data gathering and data and trends analysis, each described in further detail respectively at a) and b) below.

The second phase is change synthesis, during which all identified possibilities for developmental and corrective improvement, in response to the outcome of the data and trends analysis procedure, are considered and agreed. The two procedures are described respectively at c) and d) below.

The third phase is improvement actualisation, during which the agreed changes are collated into an overall action plan, as detailed at e) below, and assigned, as described at f) below, within individuals’ personal actions, objectives and staff development plans².

Data Gathering

Relevant information is gathered and collated from a wide variety of sources, as listed below, throughout the academic year.

Student-led sources:

• Teaching session student feedback forms (for classroom and e-learning sessions). On some courses these are distributed by the tutor to the whole group for every classroom session, on other courses they are distributed to the whole group more occasionally but tutors are encouraged to use them at least once a year for each cohort they teach. Session feedback forms are always available outside each teaching room, with a posting box by the College entrance, and students are encouraged to complete these individually whenever they have any feedback to give. Every e-learning session has an optional feedback survey at the end of the last section
  
  
• Ad-hoc feedback / discussion from individuals or groups
  
  
• Student reps input to Board of Study meetings
  
  
• Scheduled discussions with student groups, including termly visits from senior staff (typically the Principal and Course Director)
  
  
• Annual end-of-year student feedback questionnaires
  
  
• Student achievement data
  
  
• Student demographic information

Staff-led sources:

• Informal feedback / discussion
  
  
• Staff feedback forms (sessional)
  
  
• Staff course enhancement meetings and other teaching staff meetings
  
  
• Boards of Study
  
  
• End of year reports from year/stream/module leaders (included in the annual monitoring report for each course)
  
  
• Annual monitoring reports for each course, collated by the Course Director
  
  
• Periodic review discussions
  
  
• Self-study reports for accreditation and QAA review
  
  
• Staff meetings on student progress
  
  
• Annual staff development day

External Sources

• Compliance with regulations of partner University
  
  
• Reports of External Examiners and the Assessment Boards
  
  
• QAA reviews
  
  
• Professional bodies’ accreditation reports
  
  
• University/University College validation and re-validation reports
  
  
• Feedback on annual monitoring information from the Boards of Study, the validating partner, the Quality Advisory Board, the QAA and the professional accreditation bodies
  
  
• Checks from other bodies, including: Health and Safety checks; OfS finance, management and governance checks; Inland Revenue etc.

Data and trends analysis

Quantitative and statistical data is entered into relevant spreadsheets, and analysed to determine satisfaction in relation to the quality of the College service. Further spreadsheet analysis is carried out to establish trends of satisfaction over a number of years, according to the availability of historical information.

Subjective or qualitative information is analysed to identify common issues relevant to the process of continuous improvement.

Identification of possible developmental and corrective actions

The outcome of the data and trends analysis procedure is used to identify all possibilities for the improvement of the College service. Improvements may be in terms of corrective, and indeed preventive, actions to rectify identified weaknesses, or may be in respect of developmental activities.

Annual monitoring reports, Boards of Study and Academic Board meetings include identification of good practice. This is shared across the College and can lead to developments at College or individual course level.

Agree scope for change

Immediate changes and improvements which arise via informal feedback or discussion, or via the committee structure or other meetings and forums, can be agreed and implemented at the appropriate levels within the College. Typically, academic and clinical matters are agreed by Course Directors in consultation with teaching staff, clinic supervisors and management team, while administrative matters are agreed by the College Manager or the Student Services Manager/Officer in consultation with the management team. All changes must be approved by the HSU. Agreed actions are incorporated into the appropriate course or College action plan and responsibility assigned to an individual or group of staff. Any changes to curriculum or syllabus proposed after publication on SharePoint/the VLE at the start of the academic year must be approved via the HSU’s Major and Minor Changes Process.

For more substantial matters and issues arising via the annual cycle of evaluation, it is normally the responsibility of the Boards of Study or Academic Board to agree the scope of changes and improvements to be incorporated for the next two academic years. Policy matters and College-wide issues are referred by the Boards of Study to the Academic Board. Improvement actions are incorporated into the overall action plan for the course or College, on the authority of the relevant committee within the defined structure (usually the Board of Study or Academic Board).

Develop action plan

Following the scrutiny of the quality assurance data by the Boards of Study and Academic Board each year, overall course and College action plans incorporating all actions for improvement are produced according to the College’s agreed format. Further actions are added to these plans through the year as necessary, with the authority of the relevant committee, Course Director or member of the management team. All actions from the course and College action plans and from meetings of committees and boards are monitored for completion, with repeated delays being reported to the Board of Directors/Trustees.

Assign tasks via personal objectives and development plans

Agreed actions are recorded in the course action plan, Quality Improvement Plan, or the action tracking Planners for the Boards of Study and Academic Board. More substantial and/or on-going tasks are incorporated into the individual objectives and staff development plans of staff members as necessary during the year and as part of the periodic review process. The actualisation of continuous improvement can thus be monitored via reference to progress against the action plans and trackers and the individual periodic review records. Overall progress is reviewed by the Board of Directors/Trustees, which receives progress reports on completion and recurring delays of actions. All action trackers and plans are routinely updated after meetings of Boards of Study, Academic Board and Management Team, to incorporate actions identified during the year. Individual plans for staff are revised at periodic review, and during the year if necessary. Achievement against the individual objectives and development plans forms the basis of feedback through the periodic review process, and will inform the data gathering exercise for the following iteration of the continuous improvement cycle.

Session, Module, Course and College Evaluation Questionnaires

Student feedback is central to the success of our Quality Assurance process and a crucial influence on our continuous improvement.

Some NCA courses gather student feedback from all students at the end of each teaching session. This feedback is gathered by the lecturer and later shared with the Course Director. Other courses provide optional teaching session and clinic feedback forms for which a posting box is provided. All e-learning sessions provide a link to an optional feedback form. Feedback from the posting box and the e-learning sessions is gathered by the Student Services Manager/Officer and shared with the Course Director and administrative staff (if concerning an administrative or IT issue). Urgent or straightforward issues arising from session feedback are addressed as soon as possible, and fed back into the reporting and planning cycles. Key issues and overall themes are fed into the annual reporting and action planning process.

Students are also asked for more detailed feedback on an annual basis via the end-of-year module, course and College evaluation questionnaire. For students attending classes at College, these are completed in class at times which are scheduled in the syllabus. The lecturer who is teaching the session is responsible for ensuring that the questionnaires are administered. It is not acceptable to allow students to take the questionnaires home to complete – experience shows that this greatly reduces the response rate. Students on online-only courses are encouraged to complete an electronic version of the questionnaire, with reminders to complete being issued by the Student Services Officer. As more teaching now takes place online on all courses, online versions of the evaluation questionnaires may increasingly be used.

The Student Services Manager and Officer undertake detailed analysis of the questionnaires, producing bar graphs to illustrate the numerical scores, and a summary of all the written comments provided by students. She/he also produces an analytical report drawing out key themes and trends from both the quantitative and qualitative data from the questionnaires, and making comparisons with the previous year(s). The full analysis, summary and report is published in the annual course monitoring reports. These are then scrutinised by the Board of Study for each course, which agrees priorities and produces action plans for implementing enhancements. The annual monitoring reports are also scrutinised by the Academic Board, which ensures that the Quality Assurance processes are being followed, identifies College-wide enhancement themes and agrees developmental actions.

The annual course monitoring reports are published on SharePoint and the VLE and students and staff are informed. Students also learn of the College’s response to their evaluations through the formal minutes of the Boards of Study and Academic Board, and through informal feedback from their representatives on the Boards.

¹Reviewed and approved by Academic Board Nov 2021. Next review November 2024.

²Individual’s personal objectives and staff development plans are agreed at their periodic review and as necessary during the year.