How EUSA Manages Academic Standards

The Academic Committee

The Academic Committee, led by EUSA Academic Director Dr. Michael Thornhill, is responsible for the quality management of EUSA’s academic affairs, standards and structures, including the development and implementation of EUSA’s Academic Policy Manual.

The Academic Director has ultimate responsibility for academic standards within EUSA. The Academic Committee has oversight of the quality management of EUSA’s academic affairs, and includes active members of EUSA faculty and representatives of EUSA’s management. The aim is to ensure that all courses taught or overseen by EUSA are of a suitable academic standard, feasible in their allotted time, taught by appropriate faculty, and rigorously assessed within a given timeframe.

Course delivery is formally reviewed twice a year by the Academic Committee and is informed by course evaluations submitted by the student body, faculty course feedback forms, and EUSA City Director course evaluation forms.

Partner Requirements and Review

All EUSA academic courses are designed to meet partners’ academic requirements. Courses are reviewed and approved by individual university officials, often including Vice Provosts, Academic Deans, Department Chairs, faculty, and International Program Directors.

As academic credit is awarded by our partners, all of our courses must adhere to the university partner’s individual academic standards; these are all monitored and reviewed by the EUSA Academic Committee. EUSA has its own codes of practice on academic standards as contained in our Academic Policy manual. Should an academic conflict arise, EUSA engages with the university partner to resolve the issue.

As partners are fundamentally invested in protecting the validity of the degrees they award, the collaborative nature of the partner relationship places the maintenance of academic quality and standards central to EUSA activities.

Managing Delivery of Courses

Throughout programme delivery City Directors and University Relations maintain regular direct contact with partners. If academic issues arise, they are addressed as far as possible during the delivery of the program. Any such issues are reported back to EUSA via the student and City Director course evaluations, which are submitted to the Academic Committee. It is the Academic Director’s responsibility to respond to any issues which arise during programme delivery and act according to the policies or guidelines contained in the Academic Policy Manual. Should the issue not be covered by existing policies, the Academic Director will consult with other members of the Academic Committee on an ad hoc basis.

At the end of a program, partner universities are provided with final grades and evaluative feedback on course delivery.

Quality Assurance Agency

We received a commendable outcome from the monitoring visit by the Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education (QAA) in February 2019 that demonstrates that we are continuing to maintain academic standards and enhance the quality of student learning opportunities and information about learning opportunities.

The monitoring visit report is available in full at:

https://www.qaa.ac.uk/reviewing-higher-education/quality-assurance-reports/EUSA-LLP