The University of Western Australia 1. Introduction This quality assurance and improvement report presents aspects of the University's performance against its principal planning goals and objectives, and indicates some priorities for improvement in the coming 12 month period. The report needs to be read in conjunction with the University's planning material, particularly its Strategic Plan, its Operational Priorities Plan 'Achieving International Excellence', and its various management plans (detailed in Appendix 1 to the Institutional Planning submission).
The University's mission and role statements are: Mission To advance, transmit and sustain knowledge and understanding through the conduct of teaching, research and scholarship at the highest international standards, for the benefit of the international and national communities and the state of Western Australia. (UWA Strategic Plan, page 3) Role The University of Western Australia is a high quality, medium-sized university with a broad and balanced coverage of disciplines in the arts, sciences and major professions. It is characterised by a strong research and postgraduate emphasis linked to a high quality undergraduate education, across the range of its disciplines; by selected areas of research concentration; and by an international focus for its activities and standards. (UWA Strategic Plan, page 9) These statements reflect and encapsulate the University's vision as a research-intensive, internationally-focused University in which teaching and learning takes place in an environment of research and scholarship and high quality is the pervasive consideration in all dimensions of the University's planning. 2. Teaching and learning The University's primary teaching and learning goal is to provide courses of study and a learning environment at the highest possible quality to meet individual, local (State), and national needs and internationally recognised standards; and to foster the relationship between teaching and the conduct of research across the range of its disciplines in a way that sustains the quality of the institution's teaching and learning activities and distinguishes it from other institutions in the State, and many others in the Unified National System. Graduates of UWA, through their experiences as students of the University, are expected to have developed the ability and desire:
(UWA Strategic Plan, page 5) The University's approach to quality in teaching and learning is set out in detail in the management plan entitled Teaching and Learning: Planning, Management and Quality Assurance. This document emphasises the crucial importance of rigorous review, monitoring and evaluation as central elements in quality assurance and improvement. A selection of performance indicators for teaching and learning, which incorporates national Course Experience Questionnaire (CEQ) and Graduate Destinations data, along with selected UWA performance measures, is presented below. Performance indicators 1, 2 and 3 are indicators of student quality and demand and show that UWA consistently attracts the very best quality school leavers into its undergraduate programmes. UWA's market dominance of the top performing TE students surpasses that of any Australian university. Performance indicator 4 indicates a consistently high progress rate for UWA students (the third highest nationally), which is particularly noteworthy given the rigorous course standards that are applied. Student and graduate satisfaction with teaching and learning at UWA are demonstrated in performance indicators 5 and 6 which show high levels of satisfaction against a significant number of quality attributes, and demonstrate continuous improvement over time. The generic skills component of the CEQ relates well to the graduate attributes listed above. Performance indicator 7 presents graduate destinations data which show 'positive graduate outcomes' in the dimensions of employment and further study. UWA graduates enjoy success in these two dimensions greater than the national and State averages (see section 2.1). Employer satisfaction with UWA graduates is assessed by surveys conducted in conjunction with the University's departmental and course review processes, and by questionnaires administered by the Careers Centre as follow-up to the annual campus-based interview programme for employers. Other forms of employer feedback occur through the participation of employers, mainly in the professions, in various review and accreditation processes, and through ad hoc surveys of employer perceptions and requirements conducted by the Careers Advisory Board, the Institutional Research Unit and by departments/schools/faculties themselves. The overall assessment of UWA graduates through employer feedback is very good, particularly from professional groups such as the Institute of Chartered Accountants which conducts an annual recruitment programme across all universities in the State. It is not possible to present this feedback in the form of an aggregated performance indicator for employer satisfaction in the table below but further details are available on request.
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| The University is fully committed to the systematic use of national and international peer review and assessment in its teaching and learning activities, at the individual staff, department, and course level as well as in thematic reviews. An indication of success in peer review in teaching and learning is the University's strong performance in the inaugural Australian Awards for University Teaching in which UWA received three nominations (out of a national total of 17) and went on to win two Teaching Excellence Awards (in Engineering and Humanities) and the overall Prime Minister's Award for University Teacher of the Year. 2.1 National Comparisons The DETYA report, The Characteristics and Performance of Higher Education Institutions, released in November 1998, provides a useful source of comparative data that attest to the quality of teaching and learning at UWA. For example, the published data for 1996 show that:
2.2 Priorities While the above performance demonstrates high quality, the University seeks further improvement and has identified the following as priorities for 1998-99:
3. Research The University's primary research goal is to be one of Australia's leading research universities and the premier research institution in Western Australia. There are two dimensions to this goal: first, the University is committed to the achievement of high quality research and scholarship, by international standards, across the whole spectrum of its disciplines; and additionally, to the development of special research concentrations in selected areas of particular strength, importance and opportunity. The University's management of its research activities is described fully in its Research Management Plan and its performance has been reported more fully in previous quality portfolios. The performance indicators presented below have been selected to demonstrate UWA's success on the basis that data on competitive research grants and associated infrastructure funding, research publications of academic staff, and various dimensions of postgraduate research activity, combine to provide a good indicator of UWA's relative strength and performance as a research-intensive university.
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| The above indicators place UWA clearly as one of the most active and best performing research universities in Australia, arguably the best in terms of per capita research funding indicators taken collectively. The research-intensive nature of UWA is embodied in student recruitment policies (no quota restrictions are placed on honours and higher degree research enrolments); in staffing policies (research and postgraduate activity figure prominently in recruitment, promotion and tenure decisions); in funding policies (the research component of the University budget - 17.5 per cent in 1998 - is strongly performance-based); and in facilities planning (the research needs of the University are given high priority in capital planning). The University also pursues its research goal by selectively supporting concentrations of high level research performance, and currently hosts four of the 19 Special Research Centres in Australia, winning two of only eight selected nationally in the last round (1997), to be the most successful Australian university in this area. 3.1 Priorities Notwithstanding its record of excellent research performance, the University acknowledges the need for continuous improvement to achieve and sustain international standards of performance. Priorities for improvement over the next year, identified in the Operational Priorities Plan, include:
4. Community service The University's primary community service goal is to build strong relationships with the many Australian and international communities in which it plays an active role (including academic, professional, business, graduate and cultural communities), acknowledging that community service is an integral component of the University's role. The focus of the University's community service strategy over the last 12 months has been to put in place a structure to coordinate and build upon its extensive community service activities, to prepare a community service management plan in support of this goal, and to launch an intensive effort to establish a development programme. A consolidated community service portfolio and structure has now been established through the appointment of several key staff responsible to the Executive Director of Community Relations in the areas of media and community liaison, alumni and graduate affairs, market research and planning, policy development and operational planning; and the realignment of reporting arrangements to give the Executive Director responsibility for the Lawrence Wilson Art Gallery, UWA Press, UWA Extension and Festival of Perth, which collectively form a major community outreach activity. In addition, the University has brought in international expertise in the area of fundraising and development, as part of a collaborative relationship with a leading UK university; and has contracted out a major market research project to form the basis for developing a University marketing plan. The administrative structure is complemented by a Senate Community Relations Committee and an Academic Council Community Relations Committee to provide governing body and academic advice and input to the University's community service strategies. 4.1 Priorities The major objectives underlying these various arrangements are:
Significant advances have been made already to design and implement a new graduate/alumni database, to establish formal community relations activities and structures in academic departments, to redesign and upgrade the University's major publications, to be more pro-active in meeting community, business, political and media leaders, and, most significantly, to launch a major University fundraising campaign called The Hackett Foundation. The Hackett Foundation will build on the strong historical relationship between UWA and the local community and will fund strategically important projects (such as new Chairs) identified in conjunction with the faculties. These are seen as crucial components of a strategy of developing a resource and support base capable of sustaining an internationally-focused high quality university in an environment of declining Government funding and an increasingly competitive global higher education market. The longer term outcome of these strategies will be a decreasing reliance on Commonwealth funding and a closing of the funding 'gap' between UWA and the world's best (and best funded) universities. 5. Management The University's management goal is, in essence, to organise and manage its affairs to achieve the most effective and efficient use of its resources, in pursuit of its mission. In the finance area the goal is twofold: to maximise the resources available to the University from a diversity of sources, and to optimise the use of scarce resources to achieve the University's plans. UWA has achieved, through prudent financial management over many years, the highest proportion of operating revenue from investment and other income sources, and the lowest proportion of total operating revenue from Commonwealth Government grants of all universities nationally (DETYA The Characteristics and Performance of Higher Education Institutions, November 1998). 5.1 Priorities This theme of greater self-reliance is the predominant resourcing priority enunciated in the University's Operational Priorities Plan for 1999-2000, for two major reasons. First, it is fundamental to our strategy of bridging the funding gap between universities in Australia and the highest quality universities internationally; and second, it is integral to the strategy of reducing reliance on Commonwealth funding, with all its attendant regulation and restriction. Diversity of funding is crucial for the protection of the quality and autonomy of the University in the pursuit of its chosen mission. There are five areas of management priority development identified in the Operational Priorities Plan:
In these areas, as in the core functions of teaching and learning and research, the emphasis is on collaborative activity, the development of strategic partnerships, and the referencing (benchmarking) of all our activities against international standards of quality and performance. A strategic review of internationalisation has been planned for 1999, followed by a review of academic priorities and performance, and a review of organisational structures and processes, to complete the planning cycle set out in the 1999-2000 operational priorities plan. 6. Equity The University's commitment to equity and equal opportunity is integral to its commitment to high quality judged by international standards. 'Achieving international excellence' carries with it the recognition that the University must draw upon the widest possible pool of talent and expertise and make full use of the skills and abilities of all its members. This commitment must be reflected in the provision of an inclusive and supportive physical and policy environment for staff and students. The University has performed well in the achievement of its equity and equal opportunity goals and has been commended for its achievements at both State and Federal levels. The University's Equity Plan, a published component of the educational profile submission, and its Equal Opportunity Management Plan provide the basis for quality assurance and improvement in relation to student and staff equity. Mr Peter Curtis, Deputy Registrar |