Dated - June 12, 2013
Dear Colleague,
RCSI will be the subject of an Institutional Review in October 2013 under the aegis of Quality & Qualifications Ireland (QQI), the new statutory quality assurance authority for education and training. The Institutional Review process will take the Degree Awarding Status (DAS) review of 2010 as its ‘base-line’, but will be different from that review in a number of respects:
- It will focus more tightly on how we assure & enhance the quality of our programmes
- It will encompass both our degree-awarding activities and our activities in postgraduate professional training
- The outcome of the Review will not be a ‘pass / fail’ decision – the Review Panel’s report will include both commendations and recommendations
In common with all other Irish institutions that have independent degree-awarding powers (e.g. TCD, UCD, DIT, etc.), these reviews will take place on a seven year cycle.
RCSI is preparing an Institutional Self Evaluation Report (ISER) for submission to QQI in mid-August 2013 as the basis for the Review. QQI has appointed a six-member Review Panel who will visit RCSI, from 21st to 25th October 2013, to conduct meetings with staff and students. The Review report & recommendations will be published in spring 2014.
As a key part of preparing the ISER, we need to gauge the views of RCSI staff on a variety of issues. To that end, we will be launching a staff survey tomorrow and we would appreciate it if you would complete the survey as soon as possible. This is largely a repeat of the survey run for all staff in 2010. You will receive an e-mail from the Quality Enhancement Office (QEO) inviting you to participate; this will contain a personalised URL linking to the survey. As always, the QEO guarantees anonymity and all data will be fully anonymised and aggregated before being released.
Thank you in advance for your participation.
Yours sincerely,
David T. Croke
Director
Quality Enhancement Office
quality@rcsi.ie