To make sure that things are getting better all the time

- The internal quality assurance system at

Uppsala University

Bo Sundqvist

Uppsala University

Talk given at the 2nd Conference on Internal quality assurance at higher education institutions, November 30, 2006, Bern

The City of Uppsala

Uppsala University

6,000 employees - about 4,000 of them teachers

and researchers

Education and research in

nine faculties

Three Disciplinary Domains- Arts and Social Sciences

- Medicine and Pharmacy

- Science and Technology

Turnover: 0.43 M €- 60 % of which for research

and graduate education

Education

40,000 undergraduate students

20,000 FTE

More than 40 programmes of study

1,800 single subject courses

2,500 graduate students

Student exchange programs with

400 universities in 40 countries

Research

4,000 teachers and researchers

5,000 academic publications per year

(1500 in the Thompson ISI database)

400 doctorates per year

Nine Faculties

Theology

Law

Medicine

Pharmacy

Arts

Languages

Social Sciences

Educational Sciences

Science and Technology

Research Profiles

• Mathematics and Computing Science

• Educational Sciences

• Sustainable Energy

• Biological Diversity and

Evolutionary Biology

• Biotechnology

• Genomics/Function Genomics

• IT

• Bioethics

• The Multi-Cultural Society

• Peace, Democracy and

Human Rights

• Welfare and Health

• Drug Development

• Neurodegeneration and

Neuroregeneration

• Public Health Disorders

• Materials Science

Nobel Laureates

Allvar Gullstrand - Physiology and Medicine 1911

Robert Barany - Medicine 1914

The Svedberg - Chemistry 1926

Nathan Söderblom - Nobel Prize for Peace 1930

Manne Siegbahn - Physics 1924

Arne Tiselius - Chemistry 1948

Dag Hammarskjöld - Nobel Prize for Peace 1961

Kai Siegbahn - Physics 1981

Conferment Ceremony

400 doctorates per year

Walpurgis Night - the Last Day of April

Ekonomikum

Centre for Evolutionary Biology - EBC

Geo Centre

English Park Campus. Centre for the Humanities

Centre for Mathematics and Information Technology

Uppsala Biomedical Centre - BMC

The Ångström Laboratory

The Rudbeck Laboratory

The Old Forum - Gamla torget

Teacher Training

”To make sure it is getting better all the time”

• Quality is created in faculties and departments mainly by teachers and students

• The central strategies and initiatives must encourage and reinforce a culture of quality enhancement

• The university managements´and in particular the rectorsengagement are essential for a well-functioning qualitysystem

• An active student union is important in work with quality issues

• Some pressure from the outside like that from the National Agency helps

Some demands from the National Agency

Quality audits at all universties and university colleges between 1995 and 2002

Quality assessments of all subjects and programs between 2001 and 2008

Evaluations with focus on specific aspects , e.g. student influence, internationalisation

For 2007-2013 both audits and assessments

The National agency is not concerned with research

”Matrix organisation” - Rectors seminar

PhD ICT Equality Quality External Culture and

educ. Relations traditions

Univ. XXXX

Man.

Dom. XXXX

Facult. XXXX

Depts. XXXX

• A rectors advisor appointed for each area

• University management and rectors advisors meet regularly for Rectors seminar

Aspects of the internal quality assessment system at Uppsala University

The nine faculties are responsible for the quality and quality assurance in education and research

Decisions in the University board on a long term policy for quality enhancement in education and research

An action plan for central initiatives in quality enhancement is decided each year by the rector

Central unit for quality and evaluation headed by the rectors advisor on quality

A central quality committee with representatives from the various domains and the students with the rector as chairman

Aims and objectives for the unit for quality and evaluation

• Policy work together with the central quality committee

• Implementation of the annual action plan

• Support and consultative work to faculties, departments and programs

• Follow and take part in the national and international discussion on quality assurance in higher education and research

Examples of quality projects at the various levels in the university

Central level Alumni evaluationsCourse evaluationsEvaluation of PhD studies

External IT auditOn-line publication documentation system (OPUS)

Faculty level Follow up of Evaluation of PhD studiesFollow up on national education program evaluationsAnalysis and development of new resource allocation models

Dept level Program and subject-course evaluationsTo make sure that faculty further develope their skillsas teachers, researchers and managers

Experiences of the National Agencys projects 2001-2006

Positive effects and conclusions:

• UU has been successful

• The National Agency has highlighted some important national problems like subjects with few students and lack of recources for education in general

• Useful for departments:

- the self evaluation

- the site visit

- the internally implemented alumni evaluations

Negative effects and conclusions:

• A heavy burden for departments

• Lack of clarity of aims

Earlier experiences as a dean from an exercise in the Faculty of Science and

Technology

In 1995 the Faculty of Science and Technology was faced with at cut of 10% in the public grants for research. A project with the name BOT ( Cure in English) was started which asked departments to propose cuts of 15 % and proposals for new initiatives on a basis of competition on the 5% level. The scienctific results for the last 5 years were documented. Panels of 10-15 distinguished scholars at Cambridge and Caltech evaluated the proposals. The dean with the support of the faculty board made a decision on savings and reallocations based on the external advice six months later.The panels also gave important comments and advice on the working procedures at the Uppsala

Faculty of Science and Technology.

- a Program to Rejuvenate

Uppsala University

SAUNA stands for Strategic Austerity at Uppsala for New Advances

SAUNA

Our Challenge

Long-term government savings provide less scope for renewal

We must ourselves allocate means for long-term rejuvenation

This calls for new priorities

Together we will show that we can accomplish this

The SAUNA Process

SAUNA I

Reports from the disciplinary domains:

Commentsfrom students

SAUNA II SAUNA III

Advisorypanels

• Helsinki• Edinburgh• Berkeley

• Dissertations• Publications• Exams

• Savings• Initiatives

September 2000 August 2001

The Sauna Process - August 2001

Feed-back from the advisory panels

Comments from the students

Consultations with University management

The Rector’s proposal

The Sauna Process

Discussions within the University

Feed-back to the Rector

The University Board approves the proposals?

September - October 2001

Duties of Professors

The professors should take part in undergraduate education

Organize undergraduate education so that freshman students will encounter professors, especially in initial courses

Reallocate faculty funding so that promoted professors can devote at least 10% of their time to pursue their own research

Recruitment of Teachers/Researchers

The recruitment process is reviewed in order to achieve a substantial reduction of the time between the posting and the filling of a position

Search groups should be used by all faculties

Outstanding individuals are more important than persons with the “exact” credentials

Publication Patterns

The value of publishing a scientific article is dependent on the readership and prestige of the journal

The disciplinary domains and the faculties must annually report what has been published and where

They must also strive to employ this information as one of several bases for the allocation of resources

Pedagogic Development

The resources for pedagogic development at the Development and Evaluation Unit should be coordinated with Uppsala Learning Lab

A new unit is to be created to coordinate the development of the use of ICT for educational innovation. This unit will also coordinate the SAUNA projects that concern the use of ICT in undergraduate education

Chemistry Resources

The Faculty of Science and Technology, the Faculty of Medicine and the Faculty of Pharmacy are all carrying out education and research in chemistry

A coordinating body is to be established with the task of contributing to the coordination of educational programs and courses, recruitments and procurement of equipment

The Arts and Social Sciences

The Arts and Social Sciences have the largest number of faculties of all disciplinary domains

One common faculty would enable a better coordination of the administrative resources

A commission is to be appointed with the directive to investigate the feasibility and the value of a change in organization

Faculty of Education

Very limited funds are available for research today

Funds for research in teacher education are to be transferred to the Faculty of Education from the other disciplinary areas

The funds are to be allocated when the Faculty Board has submitted a strategic plan for the research in the area

Allocation of Funds for Renewal

A grand total of MSEK 50 per year

New Initiatives

Grand total:MSEK 50per year

ICT and educational

development

Multidisciplinaryresearch

Research in

Human rights

Peace and Conflict Studies

Democracy

Public Health in Humanitarian Assistance

Center for Infection Biology

High performance computing

Summary of Research Initiatives

Examples of multidisciplinary research:

Medical Law

Cultural Analysis

Pharmaceutical Materials Science

Financial Mathematics

Summary of Research Initiatives

The Sauna Process

The process should be repeated in a few years

The work should be coordinated with HSV’s assessment of the quality assurance work

No earlier than 2005, when the present proposals have been implemented and can be assessed

(The new rector has initiated a new evaluation of research)

Future directions

Undergradute and PhD education should be bench-marked with that at other international research universities

The follow up processes should be further developedAs examples: Bibliometry should be used to follow the production of scientific papers and recommendations from the SAUNA panel are not implemented fully in some faculties

The coupling of research and teaching shold be further developed and monitored

A more active quality work still needs to be developed at the department level