Quality Improvement

As a Christian enterprise the College aspires to excellence and integrity in the content and delivery of its educational endeavours and transparency in the conduct of its affairs. Over the years this commitment has involved regular comparison of our standards with those of Australian universities and the gathering of external input to the improvement of our processes and practices. The history of the ready acceptance of our graduates by churches and other employers of trained Christians and the admission of our graduates to higher degrees in well-recognised UK and Australian universities is testimony to the quality of the educational experience provided by the College.

In more recent years the College has sought and gained accreditation of all of its higher education awards by the NSW Department of Education. In each of the five-yearly reviews undertaken since 1991 the College and its awards have been accredited for the maximum allowable period (five years) and without condition. The increasing rigour of those reviews provides evidence that ongoing work within the College to progressively improve the quality of all that we do has been externally recognised.

Commencing in 2005 eligible students of the College may apply for and receive FEE-HELP assistance for their tuition fees. This is a result of the College being approved as a Higher Education Provider under the (Commonwealth) Higher Education Support Act (2003). A condition of that approval is that the College undergo a Quality Audit by the Australian Universities Quality Agency (AUQA) every five years. The first such Quality Audit is set down for 30th and 31st July 2008.

In preparation for the Quality Audit an extensive and rigorous self-review has been undertaken over the past year. This has built on a range of self-reviews conducted in recent years. This particular self-review has been organised around four Quality Audit Factors (together with a number of criteria) prescribed in guidelines provided by the (Commonwealth) Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations. The review has looked at all areas of the College and where appropriate has compared our progress in continuous improvement against that of other relevant providers of Higher Education. The results are set out in the Performance Portfolio submitted to AUQA on Monday, 16th June 2008. That Performance Portfolio may be accessed by clicking HERE.

The Quality Audit involves a visit to the College over two days by a Quality Audit Panel made up of university academics. During the visit a wide sample of College faculty, staff, students, Governing Board and external stakeholders will be interviewed by the panel. A report by the Audit Panel, which must be accessible from the College web site, is anticipated by the end of 2008. Following that the College is required to place on its web site an annual update of progress towards addressing any recommendations for improvement arising from the Audit Report. Both of those items will be accessible from this location when they are available.

(Dr) John Woodhouse
Principal
16th June 2008