Annex A

The role and remit of the Committee for Academic Quality

1. The role of the committee is to ensure that:

The learning and teaching quality and standards of the e-University are fully consistent with those expected of the best of UK higher education.
E-University programmes make the best use of e-learning technologies to provide learners and other customers of the e-University with learning experiences that are excellent in terms of fitness for purpose, and meet their learning objectives.
The e-University's activities thereby maintain and enhance UK higher education's global reputation.
Those who award qualifications are assured of the quality of the materials and delivery of learning secured by the e-University.
Those who provide learning programmes, materials and other services are assured of the quality of the operations to which they contribute.

2. E-learning has the potential to enhance the richness and reach of higher education. However, much e-learning currently provided does not meet learners' hopes and expectations as well as it could, because it does not fully exploit the opportunities of the medium. The quality of technological transmission can also be disappointing. The e-University aims to be a leader in the design and delivery of high quality e-learning. Its approach to setting and monitoring quality and standards must reflect this.

3. The e-University aims to create and broker new markets. E-learning is likely to appeal to different types of learners from those attracted to campus-based provision. We expect that it will attract global corporate and overseas customers. These learners may require different types of learning, with particular emphasis on professional and postgraduate courses leading to qualifications, as well as learning for personal interest or as components of training which does not lead to a qualification. Again, the e-University's quality and standards processes must be appropriate to this range of learners with different expectations and objectives.

4. As discussed further below, the e-University will not, at least initially, award qualifications in its own right. Its quality and standards processes will therefore need to respect the roles and responsibilities of organisations which do award qualifications.

5. The e-University's processes should be rigorous, but also speedy to reflect the nature and requirements of e-learning.

The remit of the committee

6. The members of the committee will be appointed by the operating company. But the terms of the licence will require those appointments to be made in consultation with, and with the approval of, the holding company. This reflects the committee's significance in ensuring that the e-University's operations conform with the terms of the licence and associated agreements. The staff who support the committee will be employees of the operating company, and the committee will report on a day to day basis to the board of the operating company. However, the committee will also be required to provide an annual report direct to the board of the holding company, on how it has fulfilled its role in discharging the terms of the licence.

7. The remit of the committee will be:

To determine the academic standards to be adopted by the e-University, and advise on the technological and service standards in so far as they directly relate to the learning objectives and the quality of the students' learning experience.
To determine the procedures for approving, and then oversee the approval of:
1. Learning materials and access to other learning resources.
2. Support services related to learning objectives including:
  - tutorial support, either on-line or face to face, when this is secured by the e-University to complement learning materials
  - 'navigation' and other advisory services for students
  - examinations and other student assessment services that are provided by the e-University (for example, e-based systems or physical locations to support examinations), as a service to whichever HE institution awards the qualification.
To determine the standards for testing, monitoring and evaluating the learning experience (while recognising that the committee is not the awarding body, and that it will be for the awarding body to determine the forms of assessment appropriate to the award of its qualification).
To advise on the learning and teaching aspects of the e-University's strategy.
To appoint specialist advisers and expert panels as necessary to assist it in its work.
To oversee the work of e-University staff servicing the committee and the executive functions within their remit.
To prepare an initial report on the standards and procedures that the committee intends to adopt for approval by the holding company, and an annual report on its operations thereafter for transmission to the holding company, as the primary means of safeguarding the terms of the e-University licence.

8. We recognise that UK HEIs already have extensive internal procedures for assuring the quality and standards of existing programmes, and that it is essential not to duplicate quality assurance procedures that have already been sufficiently applied. At the same time, it cannot be assumed that procedures designed to secure quality and standards in campus-based, traditional HE programmes will suit e-learning programmes and services. All programmes and services delivered through the e-University must be excellent in their fitness for purpose. The committee will need to consider how far it can derive the necessary assurance from HEIs that they already have suitable procedures in place, and the nature of any consequent exemptions that might be offered. At the other end of the scale, the procedures for approving quality and standards need to provide full assurance where materials and services are offered for approval by bodies other than UK HEIs - both overseas HEIs and non-HE organisations such as companies providing training materials.

Awarding qualifications

9. As noted above, the e-University will not award qualifications in its own right, but draw on the qualification awarding powers of existing HEIs.

10. Where an HEI provides most or all of the content and supporting services of a programme, the presumption is that it would also award the qualification on successful completion. But this may not always be so. There may be cases where an HEI provides much or all of the content, but does not wish to take on the wider role involved in awarding the qualification as well. We also expect that, over time, programmes could be constructed from an increasing range of modules drawn from various HEIs, with a range of supporting services also drawn from various HEIs, so that there is no one institution with primary ownership of the programme.

11. One further role of the Committee for Academic Quality will therefore be to consider the options for a university, or perhaps a small number of universities, to award qualifications where the originating HEI does not wish to do so, or where there is no primary originator. That would in some respects be similar to the validation function carried out now by a number of universities for courses in other institutions. The role would suit a university which already has extensive experience of validating modular programmes, and so is familiar with methods for identifying the credit value of different modules, and securing suitable progression and coherence through the assembly of modules into programmes which represent a high quality academic experience for students. The student navigators would then work closely with that university, within a pre-agreed framework. They would advise students on appropriate module combinations, and put forward proposals to the university for modular programmes for individual students or groups of students, which the university would be invited to accredit.

Relationship to the work of the Quality Assurance Agency (QAA)

12. The committee's role is internal to the e-University, carrying out functions which are in many respects analogous to those of a senate or academic board within a traditional university, although translated to the requirements of e-learning.

13. The QAA's central concern with the award of qualifications will relate to those HEIs that award qualifications for successful completion of programmes delivered through the e-University. As now, the QAA will consider how each HEI discharges that function and ensures appropriate standards for the qualifications it awards for e-University programmes, as part of standard institution-level review. The e-University will not itself be a subscriber to the QAA. The QAA has published non-mandatory guidelines on distance learning, but at present these have no formal status in QAA review programmes.

14. The QAA's subject review programme is focused on HE teaching programmes supported by public funds and delivered in the UK, and therefore will not apply to the great majority of e-University programmes. Where e-University programmes are publicly funded for UK students, the QAA's standard approach would apply to the awarding body and provider.

15. Two of the key principles of the QAA's new quality assurance framework to be introduced from January 2002 are that it will draw as far as possible on evidence generated by each HEI's own internal procedures, and that the intensity of QAA scrutiny will be related to the institution's track record and the confidence which can be placed in those internal procedures. The Committee for Academic Quality is the key mechanism through which that confidence will be achieved in relation to e-University programmes. The QAA expects to view the e-University as a collaborative partner of the institution that awards the qualification. It will be for the awarding institution to satisfy itself that the quality and standards of programmes are consistent with the award of its qualifications, including satisfying itself that the precepts of the QAA code of practice on collaborative provision are being met.

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