About Us
QAA (IQER Process)
Raj Kumaran, Director of Education at St Patrick’s College London, addressed the QAA Conference on Educational Oversight on 7 July. He had been asked to present a Case Study on the College’s application for a QAA Review, including the reasons why St Patrick’s opted for a review, the measures that had been put in place, the issues confronted, and the strategy being followed to prepare for the Summative Review.
He began with a brief history of the College, which was founded in 1803, became a private college in 1999, and currently had about 1000 students from 60 countries taking courses in 6 subject areas at HND and postgraduate diploma level, Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees. The awarding bodies were Edexcel and 3 British universities. St Patrick’s tried to remain true to its Founding Values, namely to provide an affordable high quality educational experience and employment oriented courses to its students, building and maintaining its position as market leader in the independent college sector whilst upholding the highest possible ethical and professional standards.
By way of background Raj explained that the Edexcel framework was common to all six Schools at the College, but each of the three university partnerships was structured differently, and since each School worked with only one university, the courses were managed differently. It followed that the overall course management was fragmented and disjointed; the College had become reliant on the different awarding bodies to monitor and manage quality, each in their own different manner. In order to resolve this unsatisfactory situation the College had taken a management decision in 2008 to introduce a coherent quality management framework, to assert ownership of the process. An internal working group had been set up to develop a framework for quality management by close study of the requirements of each awarding body, study of the QAA academic infrastructure (FHEQ, Code of Practice, Subject Benchmark Statements, and Programme specifications), and study of the Qualifications Credit and Higher Education Frameworks. The object of the exercise was to have the Schools and other teams in the College working more closely together. A secondary objective was to explore ways to increase the engagement of our learners, and a third was to research best practice for all areas of College activity. This included sponsoring a member of staff to do PhD level research on the correlation of teaching, learning, and achievement. The working group developed two models; a Course Management Quality Life Cycle (CQLC), showing how each course was managed, and a Semester Management Process Model (SMPM), showing how each unit/module was managed. Each model consisted of a number of Processes, People, and Documentation. These models were presented at the conference to illustrate the complex nature of quality management. The Pilot of the Models began in St Patrick’s School of Technology in 2008/9. The results of the Pilot were encouraging; it was endorsed enthusiastically by our awarding bodies, the feedback from our students was positive, and College staff were both enthusiastic and fully aware of their roles and responsibilities. In 1999 St Patrick’s management therefore decided to establish a Quality Assurance Department, to begin work in January 2010. The tasks of the QA Department were to roll out the CQLC and SMPM to all 6 Schools, and to assist the working group and take charge of quality management in all Schools.
Why IQER?
There are many different reasons why St Patrick’s decided to apply for IQER. It will enhance the quality of our product and the service we can offer our students, improve our self confidence and reinforce our commitment to high moral, professional and quality standards, earn new respect and recognition for the College and increase our competitive advantage, reassure our partners and stakeholders and increase confidence in the Education UK Brand by proving that private colleges too can add value to the Brand. Paradoxically, in secondary education in the UK the private sector has traditionally been considered superior to the state sector. In tertiary education the reverse has been the case. This is probably due to the higher degree of regulation applied only to the publicly funded Higher Education Institutions at tertiary level. St Patrick’s therefore approached the QAA in August 2009, requesting to be included in the IQER – the first private sector college to do so and well before the Educational Oversight requirement on the private sector colleges wishing to recruit overseas students from 2012. This led to a dialogue and subsequent meetings, which culminated in an agreement reached in July 2010, which included a timescale and a price of £50,655.
Implications for St Patrick’s
The development and implementation of the models (CQLC and SMPM) gave the College a bird’s eye view of milestones and stages (an A to Z), measurable objectives, and with roles and responsibilities clearly identified. The decision to apply for IQER had several implications for us. Before the IQER several changes had to be made to the structure of the College staffing. There was an overall increase in costs of about 30%, including the administrative costs of Committees, Boards and Panels. The College had focus shifting from mainly teaching, to more on learning and achievement, ie on the learner. This, and the fact that we were adding a layer of quality management over and above those already in place with our awarding partners, was an interesting learning exercise in change management for the College. After the IQER, the increased costs mentioned above will continue. The full time Student Officer post will continue at an annual cost of £18,000. And of course whilst more public scrutiny is to be welcomed in the interests of transparency, it is a double edged sword in that there is increased risk too.
Preparations for DE
Prior to the DE it was necessary to implement the CQLC and SMPM across all 6 Schools, and to develop coherent policies and procedures for all Schools. We implemented a Staff Intranet, We reviewed all our documentation and templates to ensure that they met our own standards, and we carried out a full audit for compliance.
Preparations for SR
The DE confirmed our good practice in many areas. It identified no areas of major concern, but it did suggest some areas for possible enhancement. We shall continue to adhere to our own established models of quality management, monitor and audit for compliance, and gather evidence for the review.
Subsequent to the IQER
St Patrick’s hopes to have established a robust, fit for purpose, QA regime which is easily understood, monitored, and managed. Once our quality has been established, this will enhance our reputation. It will put the learner firmly at the centre of all College activity. It will enable us to manage our future growth, and minimise or eliminate risk, particularly when it comes to new courses.
Happy to share
St Patrick’s is happy to share its QAA experience with any interested parties.
Details of the conference and the new Educational Oversight for Tier 4 can be found at http://www.qaa.ac.uk/InstitutionReports/types-of-review/tier-4/Pages/default.aspx
Raj Kumaran’s presentation, Going through QAA Review: St Patrick’s a case study can be accessed via
What is it like to be the first private college to volunteer for IQER?
QAA talks to Raj Kumaran, Director of Education at St Patrick's College – podcast can be found at http://www.qaa.ac.uk/Publications/Podcasts/Pages/Raj-Kumaran.aspx
