NUS/QAA collaborative projects
Background
During the academic year 2011/12, the Quality Assurance Agency (QAA) funded NUS to deliver three strands of work on student engagement and the student experience.
These collaborative projects resulted in:
-
The development of the Quality Matters website, which includes a suite of online training modules for course reps.
-
Bespoke support delivered to 15 students' unions on improving student engagement in quality assurance and enhancement.
-
The 'Understanding the barriers to student engagement' report, which is designed to contribute to the knowledge of the higher education sector on the barriers to engaging students in their learning experience.
-
Teaching and Learning Research, which included four mini reports on Teaching and Learning, Contact Hours and Independent Learning, Subject Differences and The 1st Year Student Experience, as well as a full report published in June 2012.
2012- 2014 projects
In 2012 NUS and QAA embarked on two new collaborative projects. These projects, delivered by NUS and funded by QAA, will span two academic years and come to an end in September 2014.
Annual Quality Reports
We are providing bespoke support 18 students' unions, of all shapes and sizes, to develop an annual report to their institution which will help them to:
-
Monitor students’ perceptions of the quality of their educational provision.
-
Monitor student involvement in quality assurance and enhancement.
-
Identify priority areas for improvement and make recommendations to their institution.
As part of the peer-led institutional review process, known as IRENI (Institutional Review of Higher Education Institutions in England and Northern Ireland), students' unions develop a Student Written Submission (SWS). Through the SWS, the students' union is invited to comment on a range of areas pertaining to quality and standards, and student engagement. This can be a daunting and time consuming process and it is hoped that by developing an annual report that covers similar areas, the burden of eventually producing an SWS will be dramatically reduced.
We will be publishing case studies written by the students' unions that we are providing bespoke support to through the project, detailing their approaches to developing the reports and the outcomes. We will also be producing some generic 'How To' guides to help unions that are thinking about developing an Annual Quality Report.
For more information, please contact Kate Wicklow, Head of Quality and Student Engagement kate.wicklow@nus.org.uk.
Staff Development
Will be creating a programme of development opportunities for staff in students’ unions who work on quality and student engagement. We want to build on the continuity and expertise provided by staff and help ensure that you’re equipped to support students in engaging with quality assurance and enhancement processes.
In December 2012 we launched a survey so that staff could tell us what the programme should focus on. We also held two focus groups with staff from across the country in January 2013.
We are now in the process of developing the programme, which will be launched at Students' Unions 2013. If you have any ideas about what the programme should look like, please get in touch with us.
For more information, please contact Ellie Russell, Quality and Student Engagement Consultant ellie.russell@nus.org.uk.