Seventh Quality in Higher Education Seminar

1. Seventh Quality in Higher Education Seminar Transforming Quality 30–31 October 2002 Melbourne

2. Transforming quality Deliberate ambiguity: can quality transform or do we need to transform quality?

3. Themes • Is quality in higher education about transforming students? • How might (external) quality monitoring be transformed to help improve the quality of the student experience and of the learning? • What has been the transformative impact of external quality monitoring?

4. Theme 1 Is quality in higher education about transforming students?

5. Quality learning • What constitutes a high quality learning process and outcomes? • To what extent is there a need to reconceptualise how higher education engages with the key issues of • access • employability • funding?

6. External evaluation Object Rationale Approach Focus accreditation provider governanace & regulation accountability medium of delivery curriculum design, admin control audit output learning experience compliance assessment learner qualification improvement standards monitoring national regional international

7. External evaluation Object Rationale Approach Focus accreditation provider governanace & regulation accountability medium of delivery curriculum design, admin control audit output learning experience compliance assessment learner qualification improvement standards monitoring national regional international

8. Interlinked elements funding learning quality access employability

9. Interlinked elements funding value for money transformation learning quality fitness for purpose excellence access employability

10. Interlinked elements funding value for money transformation institutions learning quality academic staff students employers fitness for purpose excellence access employability

11. Theme 2 How might (external) quality monitoring be transformed to help improve the quality of the student experience and of the learning?

12. External evaluation Object Rationale Approach Focus accrediting, assessing and checking provider and what is provided static elements: regulation, curriculum, outputs accountability and conformance learner learning experience improvement improvement audit

13. External evaluation Object Rationale Approach Focus accrediting, assessing and checking provider and what is provided static elements: regulation, curriculum, outputs accountability and conformance learner learning experience improvement improvement audit

14. External evaluation Object Rationale Approach Focus accrediting, assessing and checking provider and what is provided static elements: regulation, curriculum, outputs accountability and conformance learner learning experience improvement improvement audit

15. External evaluation Object Rationale Approach Focus transformation of the learner learner learning experience improvement improvement audit

16. Transformative learning • A continuous process of assimilation, reflection, synthesis and critique. • Questioning absolutes, preconceptions and taken-for granteds —others and ones own. • Deconstructing knowledge and building alternative understandings.

17. Transformative learning Accepting Engaging/ Questioning Rote Understanding Transformative learning Reconceptualising

18. Transformative learning Enhancing students’ abilities and knowledge Empowering students to be active learners

19. Enhancing learners Enhancing students as transformative learners means: • providing students with access to a body of knowledge; • enabling students to develop a range of intellectual and other attributes through which they can engage and develop knowledge.

20. Attributes intellect knowledge analysis, synthesis, critique willingness to continue learning ability to find things out communication team working interpersonal skills self skills risk taking flexibility and adaptability

21. Empowering learners • Empowering students as transformative learners means: • treating students as intellectual performers rather than as passive recipients of teaching; • encouraging critical engagement with a body of knowledge.

22. Quality monitoring? To what extent can external quality processes assure transformative learning. Approaches to date are not strong on learning at all —tend to conservatism.

23. Quality monitoring? External processes are not the primary mechanism by which transformative quality improvement in higher education is assured. Day-to-day quality assurance is through internal academic processes. External processes should articulate with, and augment, internal procedures.

24. Theme 3 What has been the transformative impact of external quality monitoring?

25. Impact • What impact has EQM had and on what? • Does it go beyond the level of rhetoric? • Does it lead to short-term response or does it lead to permanent cultural changes? • If so, does this permeate all levels of the institution or is it a management preoccupation?

26. External quality monitoring leads to bureaucratisation and inflexibility is amateurish, burdensome and inefficient is concerned with accountability not improvement leads to ‘game playing’ and ‘performance’ short-term response not cultural changes has no real impact on student learning

27. Bureaucracy • Any form of EQM would involve some level of ‘bureaucracy’. • Key issue is not the existence of a bureaucracy or of bureaucratic processes but the nature of the bureaucracy and its processes. • Bureaucracy must meets needs of external and internal stakeholders, not be self-perpetuating.

28. Quality bureaucracies Three main roles: • ensure integrity of HE • act as a catalyst for improvement • act as a conduit for useful information

29. Amateurism • Dominant approach —self-assessment, peer review, statistical data — not necessarily seen as the best approach. • Burdensome. • Most benefit to the peer assessors not the assessed.

30. Efficiency • Doubts about the efficiency of most EQM. • Cost (of agency and and to the institution) outweighs the value gained. • Periodic ‘events’ do not help inform change management. • EQM inhibits innovation through its conservative or rigid evaluation criteria.

31. Improvement • Temporary impact. • EQM must interact with internal quality systems — often not the case. • Changes in culture • slow • commitment. • Event or continuous process: performance and game playing.

32. Performance & game playing • Engagement mediated by the perceived, short-term affect. • ‘Game playing’ and compliance. • ‘Performance’ to ensure maximum return. • Obscures the reality. • No surprise: ‘natural’ outcome of accountability-oriented processes. • Game playing taking up resources for very little real return.

33. Self-assessment • Main value of EQM is the internal self-reflection. • But ‘two sets of books’. • Fear of revealing weaknesses.

34. Longevity of process • Improvement potential decreases as process becomes more elaborate and routine? • Emphasis shifts to procedural elements rather than innovative process. • Need for constant reflection on and change in EQM, more trust and collaboration. • Periodic change in purposes and in the agencies themselves.

35. Longevity “ Without periodic change, there is the danger of ending up with a British-style, QAA-type, system: a rolling ‘juggernaut’, that is not sure what it is looking for, but which ensures compliance and minimizes innovation and risk-taking. British institutions continue to comply, even if the return on the investment is derisory, because of the fear of loss of income. ”

36. Impact on learning • Extreme sceptical that EQM had any impact on programme quality or student learning. • No evidence of clear impact on learning • available research suggests that other factors outweigh the impact of EQM. • Structure and organisation of EQM is not compatible with empowering staff and students to enhance the learning situation.

37. Impact on learning? ‘ I still haven’t seen a study that directly links external evaluation to improved student learning. (NOR) ’

38. Impact on learning? ‘ We still know almost nothing about the outcome of this concern for quality in terms of improvements in student learning. (SWE) ’

39. Impact on learning? ‘ I can detect no improvement in the learning situation of students — perhaps, in fact, even the opposite. Because we spend so much time trying to lay ‘paper trails’ for audit, and trying to ensure good RAE ratings, time to devote to students (certainly for informal interaction with them) is at a premium. (UK) ’

40. “ Academics and students of the world unite and reclaim the quality agenda….. ” A Quality Manifesto

41. Thank you