Cycle 6 academic audit

The Guide to Cycle 6 is available here. A shorter, introductory guide is also available here.

The sixth cycle of academic audit for New Zealand universities has 10 components.  Cycle 6 will:

A. Maintain an internationally referenced, cyclical, peer-review model of external quality assurance.

B. Maintain a high-trust, enabling, relationship between the universities and AQA that recognises and respects universities’ responsibility and accountability for quality as well as AQA’s Terms of Reference and independence.

C. Maintain the scope of academic audit on teaching, learning, support and outcomes for students.

D. Build on and refresh the Cycle 5 academic audit framework (guideline statements) and further emphasise outcomes and the use of evidence.

E. Incorporate a thematic enhancement topic agreed by all universities that will address an issue that is both a strategic priority for universities and of national importance. The enhancement theme topic for Cycle 6 is “Access, outcomes and opportunity for Māori students and for Pasifika students”.

F. Audit universities 7-8 years after their Cycle 5 audit.

G. Include students or recent graduates in audit panels.

H. Amend the audit delivery method so that Panels spend more time together initially and that time spent at the university can be more targeted and require meeting with fewer individuals.

I. Develop audit reports to comment on outcomes and enhancement initiatives, as well as processes.

J. Include a public report on a university’s response to recommendations. A mid-cycle follow-up report on Cycle 5 recommendations will be introduced.

Further information on the development of Cycle 6 and its components can be found here, and further information on the Cycle 6 Enhancement Theme can be found here.

Key dates for Cycle 6 Academic Audit are:

The indicative audit schedule for New Zealand universities is: