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Maintaining academic standards while reducing administrative burden in 2020-21

8 September 2020

Temporary modifications provide quality assurance while reducing workload in faculties and departments.

Staff around table

A series of temporary modifications of quality assurance processes at departmental level have been agreed, to maintain UCL’s high academic standards while reducing the administrative burden, in recognition of these exceptional times. 

  1. IQR schedule put back by one academic year for the majority of departments
  2. No ASER in autumn term, and census date to be reviewed. If ASER takes place in spring term, reporting requirements will be significantly reduced. Progress against department education improvement plans will continue to be monitored in SSCCs, in partnership with student reps.
  3. Extenuating circumstances reporting to Academic Regulations and Quality Assurance Sub-Committee (ARQASCsuspended for 2020-21 academic year.
  4. ‘Emergency’ 2019-20 module amendment procedure continues for 2020-21.
  5. 2019-20 interim procedure to extend External Examiners’ terms of office extended through 2020-21.
  6. Peer observation of teaching retained, but reporting requirement suspended.
  7. Departments and Faculties encouraged to review second marking practices against current regulations.
  8. Main focus of exam board meetings to be the review of candidate achievement in, and appropriateness of, assessments used.
  9. Standard of one calendar month ‘turnaround time’ for feedback applies as normal in 20/21, but the UCL Christmas closure period is excluded. This must be communicated clearly to students.

Suggestions for ways to reduce administrative workload were crowd-sourced from across UCL, with input from Heads of Department, Departmental Managers, Directors of Operations, Faculty Tutors, Learning and Teaching administrators and academic leads, and Deans. The Crisis Review and Advisory Group (CRAG) established a Task and Finish Group, led by Professor Sasha Roseneil, to review the Education proposals and make recommendation on their feasibility and potential impact.

Further workload reduction proposals related to meetings, emails and communications, finance and planning, HR processes, estates, and research are under active consideration.

  1. Internal Quality Review (IQR) schedule is put back one year for the majority of departments.
    UCL Quality Review Sub Committee had already agreed to move all Spring 2020 incomplete IQRs to Spring 2021. The subsequent IQR schedule of reviews will be put back by one academic year. A small number of departments that have either never had an IQR, have not completed a recent  ASER or where the IQR has been repeatedly delayed will have a light touch  ‘facilitated conversation’ with the IQR team in 2020/21 to support them in reviewing performance and quality standards.
  2. ASER reporting requirements reduced though targeted improvement shaped by the SSCC cycle and student partnership activity continues.  ASER is one of our main sources of institutional and departmental quality assurance and an important way to demonstrate compliance with OfS registration. The student voice element of the ASER/SSCC cycle remains crucial: while ASER reporting activity is not required in Term One, Departments will receive data in SharePoint so that student reps and SSCC chair can review the previous year’s progress, agree on objectives for the coming year and monitor progress against them.  Whether ASER reporting will take place in Term Two will be decided in November. If it does, it will involve significantly scaled back reporting requirements with a focus on quality challenge and actions in the Temporary Operating Model.
  3. Extenuating circumstances reporting to ARQASC suspended for 2020-21 academic year.
  4. ‘Emergency’ module amendment procedure used in 2019-20 continues for 2020-21 academic session.
  5. Emergency interim procedure to extend External Examiners’ terms of office to be extended for 2020-21, permitting near automatic approval of 1-year extensions. A light touch approach to one-year extensions of the maximum term was introduced earlier this year by Exams and Assessments Contingency Panel. Extensions beyond that period should still be subject to a higher level of scrutiny. The Task and Finish Group noted that in many cases departments could reduce the number of Boards; there is also scope to limit interim boards/ pre-meetings that are not a regulatory requirement and may only take place due to local historical practice.
  6. Peer observation of teaching retained, but the reporting requirement (part of the ASER process) is suspended.
  7. Departments and Faculties encouraged to review second marking against current regulations. The current regulations are: all modules must be subject to a form of second marking; all dissertations/ research projects must be subject to full, independent, second-marking. The extent of second marking is decided by the department in conjunction with the external examiner. Apart from dissertations, carrying out second marking via sampling would comply with regulations and reduce marking workload in most cases.
  8. Ensure main focus of exam board meetings remain on reviewing candidate achievement in, and appropriateness of, assessments used.
    Building on recent changes to the exam board process and ongoing improvement to the data received, Departments will be encouraged to focus their exam board meetings on reviewing and discussing the appropriateness of the assessment and student achievement. Guidance on the minimum tasks/processes that must be performed by an Exam Board is under development.
  9. Standard of one calendar month ‘turnaround time’ for feedback applies as normal in 20/21, but the UCL Christmas closure period is excluded. This must be communicated clearly to students. Departments should ensure that deadlines are set so that students have feedback in good time to make use of it, particularly PGT students, and that pedagogical considerations are key in the setting of deadlines.