Annual Programme Review

Annual programme review is the cornerstone of the quality assurance process. It gives departments the opportunity to reflect upon the teaching and operation of a programme or a group of cognate programmes in the previous academic year, to identify successes and good practice which could be shared throughout the College and to identify any issues which require resolution.

Departments and Centres (with taught undergraduate and/or postgraduate programmes) are required to provide, as a minimum, at least one report on undergraduate programmes and at least one report on postgraduate programmes. Joint programmes should be discussed in a separate report which is the result of evaluation by both departments.

Aims

•To review the appropriateness and effectiveness of the learning outcomes, teaching methods and assessment strategies of a programme

•To monitor how far issues raised in feedback from students and External Examiners have been considered and that appropriate action has been taken

•To identify any trends in student recruitment, progression and completion, particularly with respect to identifying if more could be done to support certain groups of students in meeting the learning outcomes of their programme(s).

•To report on any new developments/enhancements in learning and teaching that might be disseminated within and outside the Department

Programme Monitoring and the Annual Programme Reporting Process

Programme Monitoring takes place through Departmental Staff/Student Forums, which must meet at least twice per academic year. Each academic department is required to convene a minimum of one forum for undergraduate programmes, and one for postgraduate programmes, but beyond this they are free to take the initiative in deciding how their programmes may best be split into representative groups for monitoring purposes. As student feedback data is considered in the Annual Programme Report it makes sense for departments, if they choose, to group programmes for Annual Programme Report in the same way as for Staff/Student Forums.

An APR may be written for every single programme, or departments may group cognate programmes for reporting purposes, or any arrangement in between provided that departments write at least one undergraduate report and at least one postgraduate report and a separate report on joint programmes which is the result of evaluation by both of the departments involved. What is common to all programmes, and what is distinct to particular programmes, should be clearly identified in the report.

Outline of process

The Quality Office will deposit the current APR template, student data, external examiners reports and responses, periodic programme review action plans (where appropriate) and PSRB reports and responses (where appropriate) and NSS results in the designated password protected folder on each department's VLE pages. The Quality Office will retrieve the completed form from each folder at the deadline.

Each Annual Programme Review report should include a brief commentary on the following:

•Student feedback data from Staff/Student Forums and the National Student Survey

•Course Evaluation summaries

•External Examiner’s report

•Data on student recruitment, progression and completion

•Learning and teaching developments/enhancements

•Any new features of the programme; teaching and assessment methods, or plans for their introduction

•Revisions or updates of the Programme Specification

Annual Programme Review reports must be submitted to the Departmental Learning and Teaching Committee (DLTC) for discussion and a copy then sent to the Quality Administrator. Discussion of the reports will be minuted and these minutes should be made available to students via their representatives on Departmental Board.

The Quality Administrator reads all reports and produces a summary raising any issues that need to be addressed at College level, and highlighting any areas of good practice. This summary report is then submitted to the Learning, Teaching and Quality Committee.

The Goldsmiths Learning Enhancement Unit considers the issues raised in the APR summary report and identifies potential enhancement activities that could be taken forward at College level. The GLEU report is also considered by Learning, Teaching and Quality Committee.

Information from Annual Programme Reviews and other evaluative material will form the basis of the Periodic Programme/Departmental Review, held every six years.

Schedule

The Annual Programme Review report is due for submission to the Quality Office before the end of the autumn term each year for all undergraduate programmes and by the end of March for postgraduate programmes.

Links

•Annual Programme Review report form for 2011-12: UG programmes