Internal Periodic Review (IPR) Framework

1. Introduction

Internal Periodic Review (IPR) forms part of the University’s overall academic quality assurance framework to undertake a broad review of all undergraduate and postgraduate (Master’s and Doctoral) provisions in a six-year cycle in order to evaluate their strategic direction and reflect upon the experiences of their students under the authority of the University’s Learning and Teaching Committee (ULTC), as delegated by the Academic Board (AB) and conducted by an independent Review Panel.

The University’s IPR framework is aligned to the key expectations and indicators of good practices under the UK Quality Code for Higher Education (HE)[1] and the equivalent framework at the University of Liverpool (UoL), as well as the equivalent requirements of National Quality Standards of Undergraduate Programmes in Learning and Teaching under the Ministry of Education of China (MoE). IPR applies to XJTLU, as it is an international university that is committed to adopting sound principles of good practices in academic quality assurance processes from the perspectives of both the Chinese Ministry of Education and the UK Quality Assurance Agency (QAA) for Higher Education.

Normally the IPR takes place every six years and is the mechanism used to evaluate the viability of the programmes and sufficiency of student support of the School/Academy/College (hereinafter referred to as Academic Unit) under review by looking into various aspects including, but not limited to, the academic unit’s academic strategy, curriculum, programme continuous development, learning and research environment, student support, staffing, staff engagement and development, quality management and enhancement. Each programme must be evaluated in order to ensure its standards and quality of provision remains appropriate with the UK qualifications, QAA subject benchmark, and MoE National Quality Standards in Learning and Teaching (for UG programmes), which may result in three possible outcomes and take effect from the following academic year:

a) The programme passes; or
b) The programme passes subject to conditions; or
c) The programme should be suspended or closed.

Where it is determined that the programme should be suspended or closed, the academic unit must follow the “Policy and Procedures for Programme Suspension and Closure” to suspend or close the programme, or follow the “Procedures for the Validation of New UG and PGT Programmes” if the programme will proceed.

Meanwhile, IPR is an important channel for the academic unit to review the sufficiency of support provided to students, a channel for students to reflect their learning and research experiences, and a channel for the academic unit and University to address related issues, and in return contribute to the sustainable development of the programme and the academic unit.

[1] https://www.qaa.ac.uk/quality-code

2. Purposes of IPR

IPR offers an effective mechanism for the University to evaluate two main focuses, the viability of a programme and the sufficiency of student support. To be specific, an IPR is conducted to:

a) check the academic health of its provision by reviewing the continuing validity and relevance of the stated aims and the intended learning outcomes of the programmes, in accordance with relevant internal and external reference points, including the QAA UK Quality Code for Higher Education, as well as MoE National Quality Standards in Learning and Teaching (for UG programmes);

b) consider the academic unit’s academic and research (including postgraduate research) strategy in the context of the University’s vision and mission, provision, and students as well as national and regional development, exploring new areas for programme development or the re-focusing or closure of existing provision;

c) consider trends in student recruitment, retention, attainment and progression, including work placements and graduate employment, across the whole academic unit’s portfolio from undergraduate to postgraduate levels;

d) use evidence of data related to student progression and achievement in order to assess the quality of learning, teaching and research;

e) confirm that the academic standards set at the point of IPR remain appropriate and are being demonstrated by students through assessment and the achievement of their awards;

f) re-confirm that the current programmes of study remain up to date with developments in the sector and remain fit for purpose in the light of the introduction of new programmes, withdrawal of programmes, and modifications to programmes since the last IPR, and that the curriculum continues to meet the needs of students and external stakeholders, including professional bodies and employers’ expectations and employment opportunities;

g) address any issues or risks concerning the curriculum, learning, teaching, assessment, research, student support, staffing, staff engagement and development, resources, and quality assurance, such as academic advising, tutorial support, professional services support, and from other teams across the University that apply to the whole provision of the academic unit;

h) support the academic unit to review the sufficiency of student support and enable students to reflect any issues and needs of support from the academic unit or the University to enhance their engagement in learning;

i) evaluate the sufficiency, completeness and appropriateness of creating learning opportunities for both in and out of the classroom which boost both academic excellence and personal development;

j) evaluate the doctoral provision in its entirety such as staff feedback on the delivery and management of doctoral programme, as well as the sufficiency and effectiveness of induction and training provided for doctoral students at the academic unit level, where applicable;

k) enable students to provide input into the academic unit’s provision and to provide feedback on the quality of the provision and their experiences of the learning, teaching and research environment as a whole;

l) assess the effectiveness of the academic unit’s research strategy in facilitating effective teaching via the research outcomes;

m) evaluate the effectiveness of Annual Programme Review (APR);

n) identify areas of good practice and areas for development within the scope of IPR.

 

3. Scope of IPR

IPR covers all undergraduate and postgraduate (Master’s and Doctoral) provisions including what is delivered off-site and uses blended and online learning. This includes the University’s Executive Education portfolio, IETE, and all other teaching and research activities.

Any programmes suspended or without registered students are covered in the scope of the Internal Periodic Review, since the IPR offers the opportunity to review them and to decide whether they should continue or not. For programmes that are no longer recruiting new students (discontinued programmes), academic units should make proper arrangements to support any continuing students. Reference should be made to these programmes in the review documentation.

Moreover, accreditation visits by a Professional, Statutory or Regulatory Bodies (PSRB) cannot replace the University’s obligation to conduct periodic reviews. However, periodic review schedules might be revised to align with a PSRB visit, or papers prepared for accreditation can be re-used for periodic review. Alternatively, there are possibilities to replace some elements of a review if an academic unit has participated in an external audit in the same year that they undergo the IPR.

On an annual basis, the academic unit(s) to be considered for IPR in the next academic year will be confirmed by ULTC in the first semester of its preceding academic year. ULTC will keep under review a six-year cycle schedule and the timing of IPRs, considering how such reviews feed into other University reviews (e.g. UoL Monitoring Visit, Annual Programme Review), accreditation events by Professional, Statutory and Regulatory Bodies (PSRB) and into the normal cycle of Annual Programme Reviews (APR). Any changes to the set schedule would be subject to the approval of the Vice President for Academic Affairs, with consulting Education and Quality Assurance Office (EQA) in the first place.

 

4. Principles of IPR

4.1 Thematic in approach

Within or alongside the two main focuses, which are considered in all Academic Units’ IPRs, each IPR will focus on one or more particular themes. Particular themes to be explored are those, which have specific strategic importance to either the academic unit and/or the University. While determining the academic units for review in the next academic year, ULTC will also decide any theme(s) to be explored during the review, taking account of prevalent issues. The academic units under review will be invited to identify any additional themes they wish to explore.

4.2 Student engagement

Under the IPR Framework, the processes for review will be inclusive of students and will be student-centered. Student engagement in the academic unit’s IPR will be mainly reflected in the following ways:

a) Students will be invited to engage in the development of the academic unit’s Self Evaluation Document (SED);
b) Where appropriate, student feedback on their experience in the first two years’ study will be obtained from 2+2 students who have transferred to the UoL;
c) There will be student membership on the Review Panel drawn from the academic unit student population based in XJTLU, excluding 2+2 students;
d) The Review Panel will meet a wide selection of students from the academic unit studying on a range of programmes offered during the IPR event;
e) Students will be involved in drawing up the academic unit’s action plan in response to the outcome of the review;
f) The IPR Report and academic unit’s action plan (where appropriate) will be discussed at relevant Student-Staff Liaison Committees (SSLC) to enable students being consulted about the draft action plan and informed by the academic unit on progress made.

The timing of IPRs, therefore, should take into account of students’ availability, particularly during assessment and vacation periods. The review should focus on the impact that the two main focuses have on the student experience and how they meet students’ needs and expectations.

4.3 Promotion of enhancement and dissemination of good practice

The IPR should encourage and facilitate academic units’ reflection on its provision and pedagogic practice, in order to identify areas for commendation and/or enhancement. The process will also enable the sharing of good practices across the University.

4.4 Inclusiveness of external evaluation

Each IPR Review Panel shall be nominated by the academic unit under review and approved by ULTC, which normally include one to two external assessors (according to the real needs) with relevant expertise in the discipline(s) reviewed, who are familiar with UK QAA processes and/or MoE quality standards in learning and teaching to provide broad, sector-wide and international context to the review. This external scrutiny forms an essential part of the University’s drive to assure the quality and standards of its provision and benchmark itself within the global HE markets.

4.5 Consideration of objective management information and data

IPR provides the University with an opportunity to gain a sound knowledge and understanding of its performance at academic unit level by considering management information and data related to admissions, student progression, achievement, student satisfaction, external examiner comments, student complaints, appeals and any disciplinary actions taken. Management information and data are subsequently used to evaluate progress against any action plan drawn up following the review.

4.6 Support on a holistic and continuous evaluation of the quality and standards of the University’s provision

IPR should provide long-term evaluation of the quality and standard of the academic unit’s provision. Additionally, outcomes of all IPRs should be considered in a continuous process and not carried out in isolation from one another and from other institutional priorities. ULTC has institutional oversight of the outcomes of IPR and evaluates the impact of changes, including those made cumulatively and over time, to the design and operation of programmes and to the student experience. The IPR is a mechanism for assessing the effectiveness of the University’s programme monitoring and review practices.

 

5. IPR Process and Schedule

5.1 IPR process

IPR will normally take place every six years for each academic unit. ULTC is responsible for determining the timetable for IPR and approves a review schedule, confirming the next academic year’s IPRs by December each year.

The Head of EQA should propose the IPR panel members for ULTC approval at least three months before the scheduled review. The Secretary to the IPR Review Panel will be a member of EQA staff.

The Review Panel is comprised of 10 to 11 members and should normally include the following:

a) Vice-President (Academic Affairs) or nominee - Chair;
b) Associate Vice President of Education – Executive Chair;
c) Associate Vice President of Research and Impact;
d) One Associate Dean of Learning and Teaching from another School;
e) Director of Centre for Academic Affairs (CAA);
f) Head of XJTLU Graduate School;
g) Head of EQA;
h) Director of Centre for Student Affairs (CSA);
i) One to two external assessor(s);
j) One student representative.

There are conditions to follow when appointing the panel members:

k) One Associate Dean of Learning and Teaching in the academic unit will be nominated by the Chair of University Learning and Teaching Committee;

l) The Dean of Academic Unit should consider the variety of disciplines and the workload involved when nominating external assessors in consultation with the Chair of University Learning and Teaching Committee, but normally there should be no more than two external assessors. External assessors must not have any current or former personal, commercial or academic association with the Academic Unit under review;

m) One student representative will be nominated following a general communication by the Head of EQA to all students in the Academic Unit under review, inviting volunteers to act as a Review Panel member. The Dean of Academic Unit will encourage students to participate and a briefing session will be provided to students on the IPR process as part of the general invitation. Another 8-20 Undergraduate and Postgraduate (Master’s and Doctoral) students, including 1 or 2 Year One student(s) will also be invited to participate in the IPR event as student representatives, of which one to two senior UG and PG student representative(s) will also be invited to participate the thematic review on the curricula of each programme. It is preferred that nominated students have overall understanding of the University, and are evenly distributed in terms of gender, year of study, and nationality, and it would be good to have part-time students involved as well.

5.2 IPR Planning Schedule

Preparations for each IPR should normally follow the following schedule:

5.3 IPR Event

The IPR meetings should normally take place over one or two consecutive days. Appendix A provides a fuller guide to the IPR Panel of the issues that they may wish to explore under the two main focuses.

The Secretary will record the key discussion points in each meeting (including the Review Panel’s private meetings) and list key issues which may emerge. This record will be critical in providing the Chair with information with which to summarise key findings for initial feedback at the end of the event and for the drafting of the IPR Report. Appendix B provides a typical agenda for an IPR.

The Secretary will liaise with the Chair of the Review Panel and the Dean of Academic Unit in advance to ensure all appropriate staff and students are invited to the appropriate meetings. Appendix C suggests a number of topics for discussions with students during the IPR event.

It is advised that each meeting of each session is led by a different member of the Review Panel, as determined by the Chair of the Panel. This would be agreed at the time when all documentation, including the SED, is made available to the Review Panel.

6. Self-Evaluation Document (SED)

In advance of the IPR, the Academic Unit under review will provide the Panel with a set of documentation. This will include an SED prepared by the Associate Dean of Learning and Teaching of the Academic unit, in consultation with its staff and students, with approval from the Dean of Academic Unit.

The SED constitutes a key document by which the Review Panel will structure discussions with the Academic Unit during the IPR. The SED should be an evaluative and reflective document on how the viability of all programmes are guaranteed and how well all its students are supported by reviewing on all the purposes listed in Section 2. Any theme(s) selected for the IPR should be covered in the SED either under the main focuses or as a separate section(s) of the document.

A list of datasets, which should be used and referenced in support of the SED, is provided in Appendix D, and an advisory template for drafting the SED is provided in Appendix E.

6.1 Student Engagement in drafting the SED

Students in the Academic Unit must be invited to contribute to the preparation of the SED.

Under normal circumstances, an initial draft of the SED will be shared with students within the timescales detailed above in the table. Students should be invited to comment on the draft SED. The most appropriate mechanism for this would be for students to be encouraged to provide a separate commentary on the SED which would form a discrete section within the document. All students of the Academic Unit should be invited to contribute to this and not just the one who is nominated to become Panel member.

Alternatively, students may be invited to make independent written comments on the draft SED for inclusion in the report as a list of separate comments. A template for students’ contribution to the SED can be found in Appendix E.

6.2 Documentation to support the SED and the Review Panel

In addition to the SED, the following documentation must be made available to the IPR Panel. This list is not exhaustive and the Associate Dean of Learning and Teaching of the Academic Unit could include other relevant materials in support of the SED:

a) Copies of the current programme(s), module specifications and module handbooks for all programmes under review with details of all changes made to each programme since its commencement or since the last IPR (whichever is the later) and if there have been no changes to a programme, this should be stated;

b) The Framework for Higher Education Qualifications², the appropriate QAA Subject Benchmarks Statement(s)³ and QAA Quality Code (Research Degrees)⁴;

c) Copies of MoE National Quality Standards of Undergraduate Programmes in Learning and Teaching;

d) Current staff and student handbooks (where these vary from the central University handbooks);

e) Staff list with their professional title and profile (giving main teaching/research interests and administrative responsibilities);

f) A summary of staff development activities undertaken by academic staff over the last six years and the number of staff enrolled on PG Cert;

g) Peer Review of Teaching schedule for the Academic Unit for the last six years with an anonymized overview of generic outcomes;

h) Student module evaluations - reports provided at Academic Unit level by the central system;

i) Results of any other student satisfaction surveys conducted by the Academic Unit over the past six years;

j) Records of induction and core training (workshops/seminars) provided for doctoral students at the academic unit level, where applicable;

k) Diagram of the committee structure in the Academic Unit, including any Academic Unit managerial committees;

l) Minutes of the Student-Staff Liaison Committee from the current and previous academic session;

m) Minutes of the Academic unit’s Learning and Teaching Committee for the current and previous academic session;

n) Minutes of external examiner induction and annual training meetings, and external examiners’ reports and responses to them for the last six years;

o) Professional or regulatory body reports where relevant;

p) Datasets used to inform the SED on:

• Admissions and registration data by level (UG, Master’s, Doctoral)
• Student retention, progression, and achievements (including academic and non-academic competitions, research activities, entrepreneurial projects etc.)
• Student surveys (including module questionnaire reports, programme survey for graduates, alumni satisfaction surveys, employer satisfaction surveys, PGR annual experience survey, PGR graduate survey etc.)

q) APR reports for the period covered by the review;

r) All current Academic Unit action plans (with updated progress) associated with QA processes and activities covered by “Quality Assurance System for Learning and Teaching” for the period covered by the review;

s) Any previous IPR reports and status of action plans;

t) List of teaching reform projects, teaching related research papers and published textbooks and any teaching related achievements for the period covered by the review;

u) List of internal and external research projects, research publications (including conference presentations, patents, software copyrights and articles) and any research related achievements for the period covered by the review;

v) List of the student engaged research projects, and students’ achievements in government driven projects and national/international academic competitions or other academic activities;

w) List of joint-delivery platforms/labs with industries (if applicable);

x) Information regarding the use of postgraduate and other teaching and research assistants.

Note:

² https://www.qaa.ac.uk/quality-code/qualifications-and-credit-frameworks
³ https://www.qaa.ac.uk/quality-code/subject-benchmark-statements
⁴ https://www.qaa.ac.uk/quality-code 

7. IPR Report and Action Plan

a) A report will be drafted following each IPR by Head of EQA. The first draft of the report will be approved by the Chair of the Review Panel and then agreed by all Panel members before inviting the relevant Dean of Academic Unit to comment on the draft for factual accuracy.

b) The report should comment on the IPR process itself and should contain points for commendation as well as areas for development. The external(s) should comment specifically on the standards of provision under review and its relationship to the relevant Subject Benchmark Statement(s) and the Framework for Higher Education Qualifications and the Ministry of Education (MoE) National Quality Standards of Undergraduate Programmes in Learning and Teaching.

c) The report should contain a section for recommendations which would be used by the Academic Unit to produce an action plan.

d) Once the report is finalized, the Academic Unit will draft an action plan, consulting with students (normally via SSLC), and the finalized report and the Academic Unit action plan will be submitted to ULTC for approval.

e) A progress report on the Academic Unit action plan will be reviewed on an annual basis during APR.

f) EQA will follow up with the progress of actions rising from IPR and regularly submit an action status report to ULTC, who ensures that the actions have been carried out satisfactorily.

g) The Academic Unit is responsible for ensuring that appropriate information about progress being made on the action plan is provided to the relevant SSLC.

h) Six months after the IPR report has been approved, the Chair of the Review Panel and the relevant Dean of Academic Unit will meet to discuss progress against the action plan, identifying any managerial aspects of the process of change, not covered under the quality assurance oversight by ULTC.

i) The IPR action plan will be reviewed at the first ULTC meeting of every academic year, and could be incorporated into Annual Monitoring Visit where appropriate.

j) A suggested template IPR action plan is contained in Appendix F.

 

List of Appendices (separate document)

APPENDIX A (Guidance for the Review Panel)
APPENDIX B (Typical IPR Agenda)
APPENDIX C (Suggested Topics for Discussions with Students)
APPENDIX D (Datasets to support the drafting of the SED)
APPENDIX E (Guidance for drafting the SED)
APPENDIX F (Template for Academic Unit Action Plan)

 

(Last Review Date: 23-Oct-2024)