How to prepare for a tornado, or Prepping for National Review and Institutional Audit, 2019

Principles The process is collaborative; evidence-led; focus is on the student experience of the programme as a means to assure ourselves of the continued quality of a programme; always a programme-level approach; quality – continuous improvement

Approach, approach, approach What is the key theme? How does it get expression in what we do? Ask questions as answered Establish a clear base – draw it up, set it out, make it clear Narrative is everything – tell the story, leave no spaces

Changing mindsets Old system – all are familiar; new system must feel and look and be different. Site visit was often particularly traumatic, so needs now to ‘walk the talk’ we have been promting.

Neither PR nor the confessional Like it or not, it’s a comprehension test Balance is essential Conduct a fair assessment Assess rights and wrongs Differentiate clearly between plans in place and achievements Panel is all – The Sound and the Fury!

Correct for the mismatch in advance WHY are we doing this links to WHAT we are doing and HOW we are doing it. Review – report – plan : need to fix the time and conceptual mismatches between these. Making it iterative does this. Discussion session is critical to ‘rounding up’ the process.

Involve staff Be the tour guide to the best guided tour! Aim is to develop fluency in the language needed for understanding / to validate responses No scripts, hymn sheets, or stock answers

Keep the learning continuous Ongoing development of staff capacity in respect of self-evaluation and programme review is core to CAPQP mission; cannot be that this does not happen without some external ‘force’. Need to be responsive – then we need to be reviewing continuously, and academic owners need to drive the review process.

The hard work is usually done by us, so… Conclusions The hard work is usually done by us, so… Make sure the bases are strong Create and support champions in all sorts of places Be familiar with the guidelines for all Panel Members and hold them to these!