IUQB publish NUI Maynooth review reports

The reports of the IRIU review of NUI Maynooth which was completed in December 2009 are now available.

The NUIM IRIU was conducted by a team of six reviewers, trained by the IUQB on Thursday 26 November 2009.

The Chair and Coordinating Reviewer undertook a Planning Visit to NUIM on Friday 27 November 2009. The Main Review visit was conducted by the full Team between 7 and 10 December 2009.

The evidence-based review process provides independent confirmation of NUIM’s commitment to quality assurance in line with national and European standards. The Review Team identified areas of best practice and challenges for further development. The IRIU process facilitated a full and frank exchange between the Review Team and NUIM (staff and students representatives). This has resulted in a report that confirms public accountability and challenges the University to continue striving for excellence in all aspects of its work.

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IRIU Update and Schedule

DCU is the next university undertaking the IRIU review process. The main review visit took place in March 2010 the reports will be published in June 2010.

View current schedule of Institutional Review of Irish Universities (IRIU).

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IUQB Hosts ENQA Training/Workshop

11-12 February, 2010

IUQB hosted an ENQA Training/Workshop in February 2010. The ENQA training sessions were for the reviewers listed in the ENQA expert pool. The experts who are not in the pool could participate in the training only if they were nominated by an ENQA member. The training sessions, hosted by the Irish Universities Quality Board (IUQB) took place at the NUI Office, Dublin.  Over 30 delegates took part from Ireland, the UK, Scandinavia and continental Europe and a series of presentations followed by workshops were presented. 

Further information on the event
Photos of the event

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IUQB Quality Seminar

3 November, 2009

IUQB held its Quality Seminar on 3rd November, 2009 entitled, Striving to enhance the Student Experience: Implementing a Student Centred Approach to Learning- The European Standards and Guidelines (Part 1) in action. The event received very positive feedback from delegates who attended.  Dr. Norma Ryan, UCC chaired the seminar.  IUQB hopes that it will stimulate further discussion, provide a forum for the exchange of current best practice initiatives in higher education and generate ideas and possible project outcomes under the six European Standards and Guidelines (ESG) themes.

IUQB has produced a Report on the Quality Seminar arising from the data collected via the workshop questionnaires and feedback received on our new dedicated blog. Please make any comments on the seminar itself, the poster exhibits and/or presentations and on how you think that the seminar could be developed for next year.

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In the Media

Dr Padraig Walsh, IUQB CEO tackles the recent controversy over 'Grade Inflation'

Further to the recent media attention on 'Grade Inflation' in Universities Dr Padraig Walsh puts forward his position on the importance of monitoring and safe-guarding the high standards of the seven Irish Universities and explains the role that IUQB plays.

Talk Back, Irish Times

16 March 2010

Standards in our universities are closely monitored, argues Dr Padraig Walsh, CEO, IUQB. THE ISSUE of so-called “grade inflation” has led to much recent media comment about the standards of Irish university awards and concern about the quality of university graduates. It has led to calls for much more serious scrutiny of regulatory authorities such as the Irish Universities Quality Board (IUQB).

To address concerns about quality and standards, it should be noted that the performance of the Irish university sector is not “average”. Two of our colleges are ranked in the world top 100 and all seven were ranked in the top 200 universities in Europe.

In relation to the international standing of Irish graduates, the world university rankings contain a score for employer review. Two of the Irish universities score in the mid- to high-90th percentiles on this ranking and all score over the 60th percentile.

There was an increase in the percentage of students graduating with first-class honours from the universities from 1994 to 2004, largely due to the response of universities to comments from external examiners that Irish students were being disadvantaged by the reluctance to award the top grade.

However, from 2004 to 2008, the percentage of first-class honours awarded in honours bachelors degrees (level 8) in the seven Irish universities were 13%, 15%, 13%, 14% and 14%.

It must be noted that there is a greater variation in the award of first-class honours between different disciplines in the same university than there is between the same disciplines in different universities. This variation is largely due to traditional marking practices in the different disciplines and this data should be highlighted and be subject to further research and analysis.

In relation to the quality oversight of Irish universities, it is important to stress that unlike secondary school, there is no prescribed national curriculum for universities. Irish universities are autonomous, responsible for developing, delivering and assessing the content of their programmes and for making and quality assuring their awards.

The system of assessing and grading of students by the teachers themselves, its supervision by internal examinations boards and the input of the external examiners appointed by the university to check this process describes the university’s internal quality assurance system.

Since 1997, the Universities Act requires universities to additionally undertake evaluations of each of their academic departments using external experts and to publish the findings (all are available on the universities’ websites from the IUQB website). This is a further element of the universities’ internal quality-assurance system.

The 1997 Act also requires each university board (governing authority) to commission periodic reviews of the effectiveness of each university’s internal QA system. In 2002, the governing authorities of the seven Irish universities established the Irish Universities Quality Board and passed this external review function over to it. The IUQB commissions these reviews and publish the findings and recommendations arising from them. In respect of the outcomes of these reviews, IUQB exercises no regulatory powers.

All seven universities were evaluated (by external international experts) in 2004 with the reports published in 2005. A second cycle of reviews was agreed in March 2009.

The first evaluation, of NUI Maynooth, will be published today. The second evaluation report, of DCU, will be published in June. Reviews of the other universities will follow at the rate of two per year.

In 2008, IUQB was evaluated by an external review panel (including international experts), to ensure it was operating within the agreed European Standards and Guidelines for Quality Assurance. The IUQB received full membership of the European Association for Quality Assurance in Higher Education (ENQA).

In 2009, following scrutiny by the European Register Committee, IUQB was accepted on to the European Quality Assurance Register (EQAR).

The IUQB has members from the Irish university sector on its board but it also has a majority (60 per cent) of external members. It is chaired by a retired supreme court judge and contains nominees of IBEC, USI, ICTU, HEA, plus international members. All quality-assurance agencies for higher education contain members from the institutions that they evaluate.

The IUQB, in its public submission in June 2009 to the National Strategy on Higher Education, called for internal university quality review reports to be tailored to non-specialist audiences such as prospective and current students, parents and employers; a modernisation of the external examiner system; an improvement in how the public can access detailed and reliable information on the quality of individual study programmes, faculties and higher education institutions.

The decision to amalgamate the various qualifications and quality assurance bodies (FETAC, HETAC, NQAI and the functions of IUQB) was announced in the budget of October 2008 and not, as has been alleged, after US multinationals complained about the standard of Irish graduates nor in the wake of the recent official inquiry into so-called “grade inflation”.

The Irish university system (institutions, funding bodies and quality-assurance agencies) must, however, be more transparent and must improve how it informs the public as to who is responsible for standards and quality and how it intends to provide sufficient data and, more importantly, a sufficient level of analysis about the system to the public.

Irish Times
(16 March 2010)

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Quality Corner

Our Excellent Universities Top
EU League Table for Efficiency

John Walshe, Education Editor, Irish Independent published an article based on a recent EC report. The article highlighted the positive findings of the report which revealed that Irish universities are at the top of a European efficiency league table, that Irish graduates are the most highly employable in Europe and that Irish universities have the highest graduation rate in Europe.

IUQB welcomes the findings of this report, however, our CEO Padraig Walsh advocates that the Irish university system must be more transparent.

The full text of this article appears below

IRISH universities have received a major boost by coming at the top of a European 'efficiency' league table. Weeks after complaints about dumbing down and grade inflation, an EU study reveals that:

• • Irish graduates are the most highly employable in Europe.

• • Irish universities have the highest graduation rate in Europe.

• • Ireland has the highest percentage of graduates in Europe.

• • Universities in Ireland, Finland and Sweden are given the highest 'excellence' rating by academics in other EU countries.

The president of NUI Galway, Professor Jim Browne, said last night that the study was a clear vindication of the efficiency of the Irish university system. There had been too much emphasis on inputs and time spent on hours teaching but the real measure was the "output" and Irish universities had been shown to be very efficient in that regard.

In the case of Galway, student numbers will have increased by 10pc in December over a two-year period, while staff numbers have been cut by 6pc and staff have had to contend with a 10pc pay and pension loss.

"Coping with this increase in student numbers is a great tribute to the staff," he said.

The report says recruiters regard universities in Ireland and the UK as providing highly employable graduates.

On the other hand, Spanish, Polish and Portuguese universities perform poorly on this yardstick. It says also that considering their size, Finland, Ireland and Sweden are the countries with more universities pointed to by their peers as being "excellent". Spain, Portugal and Greece also perform poorly on this indicator. The report concludes that Ireland, Japan, Sweden, the UK and the Netherlands are at the top in terms of efficiency or to use the jargon "at the production possibility frontier".

"In some cases, this was essentially due to excellent scientific production (Sweden, Finland and the Netherlands), whereas Ireland attained its position due to the graduation output, which is not only high in number but also the best in perceived quality."

By contrast, France, Germany, Italy, the southern and eastern European countries were way down the efficiency scales as was the US. The report says efficiency tends to be higher in countries where institutions are publicly evaluated by stakeholders and independent agencies. The autonomy of the institution when it comes to hiring and firing is another factor linked to efficiency.

The report says that Ireland, France and the eastern European countries are particularly efficient in teaching whereas the Nordic countries specialise more in research.

The findings were welcomed by the Irish Universities Quality Board whose chief executive Dr Padraig Walsh said, however, that the Irish university system must be more transparent.

"It must improve how it informs the public as to who is responsible for standards and quality and how it intends to provide sufficient data and, more importantly, a sufficient level of analysis about the system to the public."

Irish Independent
(26 March 2010)

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Dear Viewer,

Thank you for taking the time to look through our newsletter.

We welcome your input on any best practice initiatives within your institutions and will highlight them in future editions. Please email submissions for the Quality Corner to me here.

Your feedback to any articles or quality related issues is very welcome and will be answered as quickly as possible.

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