Educational - Ozean Publications

European Journal of Educational Studies 2(2), 2010institutional activity. Institutions are expected to be generally regarded among academic community and other stakeholders aswell-founded, cohesive, self-critical and worthy organisations safeguarding their vision, mission, aims, functions, academicstandards and social commitment the range of stakeholder interests.Agencies of QAAHE may require a precondition that Faculty of Social Work in Helwan University in Egypt undergo aneligibility phase. Upon successful completion of this phase, they are eligible for accreditation. Some of these generaleligibility criteria for institution applying for QAAHE are that: established Faculty of Social Work in Helwan University inEgypt should already be offering the educational programmes to be accredited, and new institutions should be recognised bythe relevant authorities and should already have been offering educational programmes for a specific period; institutionsshould be able to demonstrate that they have considered all available strategic options for academic development and thatthey are committed to continuing improvement in their academic activities; and institutions should be able to demonstrate thatthey meet the requirements of quality audit (as system for internal quality review and for reporting academic activities) inorder to assist in preparing the self-evaluation study and communication with the agency.Assuring and accrediting the quality of Faculty of Social Work in Helwan University in Egypt require attaining certainprocedures. Illustration of these procedures follows.Self-studyAgencies of QAAHE requires from Faculty of Social Work in Helwan University in Egypt aiming at assuring and accreditingtheir quality to conduct a self-study evaluating several dimensions. Illustration of these dimensions follows.Mission: This procedure requires identifying its related general concepts, mission statement, definition of programmes, aims,Intended Learning Outcomes (ILOs), dissemination of the mission statement, and any updates of the mission.Governance: This dimension needs illustrating its related general precepts, organisational structure, academic duties andresponsibilities, method for recruiting academic leaders; effectiveness of policies, systems and practices and their adequacy inachieving ILOs, quality improvement and dealing with student and staff problems; responsiveness to changing priorities andemerging needs including methods used to disseminate the vision for development, availability of priority identificationsystem to respond to change and review policies, mechanism used by top managers to cope with and respond to changes andmanage resistance to change; contribution of any recent quality improvement/enhancement activities aimed at achieving themission of the institution.Staff: This component requires illuminating its general precepts, future needs of staff and their professional development;statistics covering staff numbers by type, grade and qualification, suitability of staff profile, staff development programmewith indicating its adequacy and corrective measures.Programmes: This element requires indicating its related general precepts, rules and regulations governing educationalprogrammes, academic standards and quality of learning opportunities, which Teaching and Learning Strategies (TLSs) areadopted along with their adequacy in achieving ILOs; overall statistics for the institution including the available number ofeducational programmes, number of students registering in each programme, admission indicators in each programme,number of graduate in current academic year and percentage of graduates in each year with a view to include correctivemeasures for deficiencies in statistics, educational programme framework providing the number of credit hours or courses perprogramme, and percentage of courses providing the academic structure of programmes developed and based on programmereports, with a view to mention whether any programme exists for outstanding students along with details of admissionrequirements and contents of, and demand for such programmes.Standards: This dimension needs clarifying academic standards compared with references and based on programme reportsidentifying good practices (for application in other similar programmes), corrective measures in case of failing to achieveexpected standards, student assessment for examining whether there are different methods of assessment, checking whetherthe language used in assessment is the same as the medium of instruction, verifying whether students are informed of thegrading criteria for assessment, checking whether the grading system is appropriate, examining whether students are givenfeedback to their assessment, checking whether the institution has policies and procedures for appointing examining boardsand how to obtain external examiners, comments on the appropriateness of assessment methods used with references to theILOs and external references/benchmarks, student achievement with reference to employment opportunities, comment onstudents’ achievement in regard to the number of passing graduates, which programmes the percentage of students graduatingis high indicating reasons for this and any elements of good practice that can be replicated, which programmes percentage ofstudents graduating is low clarifying reasons for this and the corrective measures for recovery, institution’s vision forgraduates’ employment possibilities, availability of jobs, appropriateness of academic qualifications for employment,emerging needs for specific qualifications in the labour market, oversupply of graduates, remedial measures (indicatingadjustment mechanisms for TLSs) designed to make a better much between education and employment, external assessment,59