QA Policy
Preface:
Universities are seats of higher education dedicated to learning and personal development of their members, sources of expertise in various disciplines and sites for evaluation and application of new knowledge. With globalization and internationalization, the demand for accountability and transparency in higher education has increased. The biggest challenge in this regard, is to ensure that the quality of educational programs offered by a higher educational institution are meeting the local and international standards.
Sohail University has a comprehensive Quality Enhancement (QE) policy along with explicit processes that act as a driver to achieve excellence in higher education
OBJECTIVE:
The basic aim and objective of the quality Enhancement policy is to ensure that relevant and appropriate academic standards are achieved, maintained and continuous efforts are instituted to further improve the quality of the higher education deliverables
Policy Statement:
Sohail University is committed to continual enhancement of quality of education, training, research and service to the community and nation, through firm commitment to its vision and mission.
Some important aspects of this policy are:
- All the stakeholders are involved as partners in maintaining and enhancing the quality.
- Processes and practices are systematic, sustainable and transparent.
- There is regular monitoring and evaluation of all activities in the core areas of teaching /learning, research and service to the public.
- Decision-making is evidence-based as findings from the previous institutional audits are used to provide future directions and improvements hence closing the feedback loop.
- Outcomes from quality enhancement and assurance processes are disseminated to the concerned stakeholders.
Scope:
This policy is embedded in the university learning culture and embraces all the institutions/ faculties/centers/departments, students, faculty members and staff and all the teaching learning resources and facilities of Sohail University.
Mechanisms for implementation of QA Policy:
- Internal Quality Assurance
- External Quality Assurance
Internal Quality Assurance:
PREE of all Programs
QEC undertakes internal Quality Assurance of Academic programs by utilizing Program Review of Effectiveness and Enhancement (PREE) process and produces PREE Reports. These reports provide feedback for enhancing the quality of the programs and are presented for review by External Accrediting bodies.
Quality Enhancement Cell (QEC) is responsible for planning, coordinating, keeping in view all the 8 PREE standards and following up on the PREE activities. PREE is an annual cycle and once a program completes its PREE it has to undergo a complete review every year.
The steps for PREE are as follows:
- QEC initiates the PREE after seeking permission from the Vice Chancellor’s Office.
- Upon receiving the initiation letter the Head of the concerned department (HOD) forms a program team (PT). The PT is responsible for preparing PREE report of the program under the guidance of QEC.
- The department submits the PREE to QEC through the concerned HOD. QEC reviews the PREE to ensure that it is prepared according to the required format.
- The Vice Chancellor approves a program assessment team (AT) in consultation with QEC. The AT comprises of 2-3 faculty members from within or outside the program/university. The AT must have at least one expert in the area of the assessed program.
- QEC plans with the help of departments and schedules the AT visit in coordination with the concerned department.
- The AT conducts the assessment, submits a report and presents its findings in an exit meeting that is attended by the QEC, HOD/Dean and PT and faculty members.
- QEC submits an executive summary on the AT findings to the Vice Chancellor.
- The Department prepares and submits an Implementation plan to QEC, based on the AT findings. The plan includes AT findings and the corrective actions to be taken, assignment of responsibility and a time frame for such actions.
- QEC follows up on the implementation plan to ensure departments are adhering to the implementation plan. The academic department shall inform the QEC each time a corrective action is implemented. QEC shall review the implementation plan once a semester to assess the progress of implementation.
The process of institutional internal quality assurance (institutional self-assessment) is illustrated in the Table and Figure below.
Table 1: Pre-visit activities
IQAE reviews follow-up report to check status of all observations and whether they all are addressed or not:
- Current progress status against each finding/recommendation
- Timelines defined for each corrective action is being followed
- If not, then proper justification and revised timelines provided
- Constraints affecting the progress are properly documented.
If anything is missing, the report will be referred back to the concerned committee. If not, move to step 6.
IQC constitutes RIPE committee by meeting the conditions below:
- Review committee shall consist of five to seven members (internal and external)
- At least one external member shall be included from HEC’s pool of experts
- The internal members should preferably comprise seasoned and senior academics and administrative heads.
An orientation session will be organized by IQAE to brief the RIPE committee members, that include:
- RIPE Standards
- Expectations of HEC
- Review process.
Review the documentary evidence against the claims made in IPR for validation and list the questions/probing questions to be asked of different stakeholders.
Hold separate meetings with:
- Students (bachelor’s, master’s, PhD)
- Faculty (senior & junior faculty members)
- Academic heads (Deans/HoDs/Principals, and so on)
- Administrative staff (Registrar, Controller of Examinations, Treasurer, Director of ORIC, Director of Research, and so on)
- Directors of Campuses (in case of sub-campuses), Heads of selected affiliated colleges (in case of affiliated colleges) to have an insight on institutional performance in accordance with their respective domains and to get feedback about any issues that may be inhibiting progress.
Visit to assess classrooms, libraries, laboratories, studios, cafeteria, student accommodation, sports, auditoriums, transport, and so on, in order to get a clear picture of all the facilities.
Meeting of the RIPE committee members in a separate space for finalisation of findings before the visit ends.
- RIPE Committee submit reports to IQAE.
- IQAE ensures that report is signed by all RIPE Committee members.
- In case of any conflict, IQAE moderates to resolve the conflict and finalises report with mutual agreement of all members.
Figure 1: The process of institutional internal quality assurance
the process
IPR Preparation/
Update Committee
IPR report
for completeness
No
Self-RIPE review
orientation of RIPE
Committee
members by IQAE
Follow-up
Committee
report
observations in
follow-up report
No
report shared with
RIPE Committee
members for
review
schedule with
consent of RIPE
Committee
members
Self-RIPE report
review and approval
departments for implementation
Institutional self-assessment criteria and source of information
The Quality Assurance Framework below is divided into four parts. Part 4 of the Quality Assurance Framework is concerned with internal quality assurance and is subdivided into programme-level quality assurance and institutional level quality assurance.
Precepts, Standards
and Guidelines for
QA in HE
Reviewing
Effectiveness of
Quality Assurance &
Accreditation Bodies
External Quality
Assurance at
programme and
institutional levels
Internal Quality
Assurance at
programme and
institutional levels
Institutional level quality assurance is concerned with the RIPE Standards set out in the Quality Assurance Framework, against which each institution is required to align.
The RIPE Standards as set out in the Quality Assurance Framework are as follows. Higher education institutions are expected to use all RIPE Standards in framing the institutional approach to quality assurance.
Strategic Development
- Standard 1: Vision, mission, goals and strategic planning
- Standard 2: Governance, leadership and organization
- Standard 3: Institutional resources and planning
- Standard 4: Audit and finance
- Standard 5: Affiliated colleges/institutions
- Standard 6: Internationalization of higher education and global engagement
Academic Development
- Standard 7: Faculty recruitment, development and support services
- Standard 8: Academic programmes and curricula
- Standard 9: Admission, progression, assessment and certification
- Standard 10: Student support services
- Standard 11: Impactful teaching and learning and community engagement
- Standard 12: Research, innovation, entrepreneurship and industrial linkage
Institutional Development
- Standard 13: Fairness and integrity
- Standard 14: Public information and transparency
- Standard 15: Institutional effectiveness, quality assurance and enhancement
- Standard 16: CQI and cyclical external quality assurance
Detailed information about the Standards, including what a higher education institution should do to meet each of the Standards and how to do so, as well as a contextual statement to explain the reasoning behind each Standard, are provided in Annex 3.
A wide range of information should be considered in the institutional self-assessment. The IQAE draws on the programme and departmental self-assessments, alongside the self- assessments from support, administration and managerial areas, as well as evaluations from students and stakeholders, in writing an institutional self-assessment that clearly represents the accumulation and distillation of institutional reflection and evaluation and involves all stakeholders from the Vice Chancellor and senior managers through faculty and administration staff to external stakeholders and students. In summary, all information included in the Figure below should be consider in developing the institutional SA document.
SA
evaluation
SAs
Chancellor SA
and
Departmental
SAs
SAs
SAs
evaluation
External Quality Assurance:
External Quality Assurance also known as accreditation is carried out by regulatory/professional bodies at national level to ensure the minimum performance standards of academic programs of Higher Educational Institutions and promotes public confidence that the quality and standards of the award of degrees are enhanced and safeguarded.
QEC supports and facilitates external quality assessment to ensure continuity of the processes of the Quality Assurance and Enhancement. Baseline information provided through internal review of Academic programs helps in setting the standards for external review by peers or accrediting agencies.
Standards and Guidelines for Review of Institutional Performance and Enhancement (RIPE) for IQA and EQA is given in Annexure 3 in RIPE manual of HEC QAA. (https://www.hec.gov.pk/site/QAA
Quality evaluation and enhancement matrix and Judgement framework would be an accordance with annexure 5.
An extract of categorization standards is attached as under:
Categorisation of Standards
- RIPE Committee submit reports to IQAE.
- IQAE ensures that report is signed by all RIPE Committee members.
- In case of any conflict, IQAE moderates to resolve the conflict and finalises report with mutual agreement of all members.
- RIPE Committee submit reports to IQAE.
- IQAE ensures that report is signed by all RIPE Committee members.
- In case of any conflict, IQAE moderates to resolve the conflict and finalises report with mutual agreement of all members.
Funding formulae may be linked with RIPE judgement