PAPER 05: School Annual QA Report 14/15

School Annual Quality Assurance and Enhancement

Report Template

Purpose of Policy

The policy is the University framework for annual quality assurance and enhancement reporting by Schools to the relevant College.

Overview

The policy sets out the key areas of quality assurance and enhancement on which Schools report consistently across the University on an annual basis. Themes from School reports are identified by

Colleges and form the basis for action and dissemination of good practice at College level. Themes identified by Colleges are reported annually to Senate Quality Assurance Committee, which identifies areas for action and dissemination of good practice.

Scope: Mandatory Policy

Scope in relation to report content: all credit-bearing provision.

Scope in relation to staff roles: School Directors of Quality have overall responsibility for preparing the

School annual quality assurance and enhancement report to College. They liaise with other roles in the

School as relevant to the School context.

Contact Officer Linda Bruce

Academic Policy Manager,

Academic Services

linda.bruce@ed.ac.uk

Document control

Dates

Approved :

28.05.15

Starts:

01.08.15

Approving authority

Consultation undertaken

Equality impact assessment:

Published

Amendments:

Next Review:

2015/16

Senate Quality Assurance Committee

College Dean/Associate Dean/Director of Quality, College Office administrators, School Directors of Quality and professional staff

Section responsible for policy maintenance & review

Academic Services

Related policies, procedures, guidelines & regulations

UK Quality Code

Policies superseded by this policy

Alternative format

College Annual Quality Assurance and Enhancement Report

Template, Quality Assurance, Monitoring and Reporting of

Postgraduate Research Provision

Chapter B8, Programme Monitoring and Review; Chapter B5, Student

Engagement; Chapter B7, External Examining; Chapter B3, Learning and Teaching; Chapter B11, Research Degrees.

School Annual Quality Assurance and Enhancement Report Template

2014/15

If you require this document in an alternative format please email

Academic.Services@ed.ac.uk or telephone 0131 650 2138.

QA report, QAE report, annual quality report, School annual quality report, School Quality Assurance and Enhancement Report

Keywords

R(D)SVS (BVM&S Programme) Annual Quality Assurance

& Enhancement Report 2014/15

Formal confirmations

Has this report been discussed at the relevant School committee (Quality Assurance/ Learning and Teaching)? YES – including student rep

Has this report been discussed at a Student-Staff Liaison Committee or equivalent forum? NO

If N, have arrangements been made to discuss at the next meeting/equivalent forum? YES

Student representatives are members of both committees where this report will be discussed (VMQAC and LTC).

GLOSSARY OF TERMS

ASSET – Assessment Executive

BOE – Board of Examiners

BVM&S – Bachelor of Veterinary Medicine & Surgery

EERS – External Examiner Online Reporting System

EMS – Extra Mural Studies

GEP – Graduate Entry Programme

LTC – Learning & Teaching Committee

OSCEs – Objective Structured Clinical Examinations

VMQAC – Veterinary Medicine Quality Assurance Committee

VMED – Veterinary Medical Education Division

VSC – Veterinary Students’ Council

VTO – Veterinary Teaching Organisation

SCHOOL CONTEXT

Provide brief context about School – subject areas, list of School degree programmes, overall student numbers (UG, PGT & PGR) and highlight any major changes since the last report e.g. increase in student numbers in a particular category.

NOTE: This report will only include matters relating to Undergraduate Quality Assurance and

Enhancement – postgraduate QA is the responsibility of the MVM College Office.

The School has two undergraduate programmes: a 5 year programme and a 4 year Graduate Entry

Programme, both leading to a Bachelor of Veterinary Medicine &Surgery (BVM&S) degree. This is a qualification in Veterinary Medicine and Surgery which is accredited by the Royal College of

Veterinary Surgeons (RCVS), American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA) and European

Association of Establishments for Veterinary Education (EAEVE). The student cohort on the 5 year programme comprises both school leavers and graduates. The 4 year GEP programme is designed for graduates with an Honours (or equivalent) degree, generally in Animal or Biological Sciences. We have students from the UK, EU and International on both programmes. The final 3 years of both programmes are identical and at this point the two programmes are taught together, with the cohorts joining together in year 3.

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Numbers of students on programme by year of curriculum

GEP

Year 1

Year 2

2013/14

51

130

115

Year 3

Year 4

Year 5

TOTAL

167

161

160 (all graduated)

784

2014/15

51

131

114

162

163

157 (all graduated)

778

Total number in 2012/13: 778

Total number in 2011/12: 756

As can be seen above there have been no significant changes to the total number of students on the

4 and 5 year BVM&S programmes over the past 4 years.

1.

QUALITY ASSURANCE

1.1 Progress

Report progress in addressing School level issues/recommendations/actions from the previous year’s report, including whether and how staff and students have been advised of progress.

The School continues to monitor its Programmes, Student Experience and Quality Enhancement by not only reviewing the courses, student feedback and communication between students, staff and external examiners but also by regular review of its QA processes via the Veterinary Medicine QA

Committee (VMQAC) (see 1.5).

VMQAC meets 4 times in each calendar year and members undertake independent reviews of each of the courses in the BVM&S curriculum. QA documentation used by staff, students and reviewers is reviewed each year for ease of use, clarity and gaps in information collected.

The School continues to support and enhance its Widening Access activities with the aim of seeing an increase in Widening Participation (WP) applications and entrants.

The major change in 14-15 was the roll out of the new final year structure with core rotations finishing at the end of semester 1, leading into the new student selected phase. We are extremely pleased with how this worked given the magnitude of the change. Students appreciated the flexibility and chance to really engage with getting prepared for the workplace hence as a mechanism to enhance employability we feel we have achieved our objective. Equally pleasing was the 100% pass rate at finals – again this was made possible by the new structure allowing us to identify struggling students earlier and remediate/ support as necessary.

The new final year OSCEs were implemented which was a large logistical exercise but an essential component of the new structure.

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Progress in addressing the themes identified from External Examiner reports in 2013/14 has been effective this year with action taken on all major cross-course themes identified from the reports.

The School recognises the importance of continued work to maintain progress on themes such as standard setting and exam statistics, question writing training for staff and ensuring robust communications with External Examiners on exam papers and the provision of model answers. It has also identified new themes from 2014/15 to action in the coming year (see 1.3.4).

Despite making end of course surveys available within a few days of completion of teaching last year, response rates are still lower than we would like. To address the continued low response rates to end of course surveys in 2014/15, and after consulting with our students, for 2015/16 surveys will be made available in paper copy and distributed to students in class rather than disseminated online. The School has adopted the centrally supported EVASYS method for all course survey provision and analysis of the resulting data.

The plans to move all teaching materials entirely from EEVeC to Learn during 2014/15 were not achieved but are on course for completion in 2015/16.

A BVM&S Learn working group was set up to review the current use of LEARN for the delivery of UG teaching within the School and to make recommendations/ suggest changes to improve user experience. This group aims to not only enhance the use of Learn in our teaching but also address the concerns of both students and staff regarding confusion as we transition from EEVeC to Learn for delivery of teaching.

The School continues to recognise the importance of maintaining momentum with regard to enhanced student support comprising a suite of support mechanisms which are on-going and developing. These include: the R(D)SVS House System, Dick Vet Peer Support programme, VetPALs scheme, Personal Tutor training, a full-time Student Experience Officer and the regular availability of

University Central Student Support Services at the Easter Bush Campus (Student Counselling and

Student Disability Service). R(D)SVS staff are involved in the current ongoing Student Mental Health

Review project as well.

Staff and Students continue to be advised of progress on any issues through established mechanisms such as the BVM&S Learning and Teaching Committee/ Open Boards of Studies, the Veterinary

Student Council and the ‘You Said, We Did …’ campaign (see 1.4).

Exam markers are now asked to complete a Failed Question Template when marking, which asks for reasons and an explanation of the reason for the Fail. These sheets are kept with the scripts so they can be referred back to by students when they review their scripts and attend exam feedback sessions.

Compliance with in-course formative feedback deadline of 15 working days – info is in Section 1.4.

The great majority of courses succeeded in delivering feedback within 15 working days (19/21 courses). We are aiming to achieve 100% in 2015/16.

Standard outline agendas are now in use for SSLC meetings and Post Course Review meetings, with the flexibility for courses to add additional items as necessary. This should enhance our ability to compare across courses, gather effective feedback and discussion annually but allow for variation between courses in terms of delivery and assessment.

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The R(D)SVS Undergraduate Certificate in Veterinary Education, introduced in 2013/14, has seen a significant increase in student interest and enrollment. The Certificate gives formal recognition and credit to our students in a modular format for all the educational teaching activities in which they are involved. The activities include core and elective elements; with approval, students can suggest and design elective activities. Modules include educating the non-veterinary public (e.g. pet owners, school pupils (see 1.2.9), educating their peers or near-peers and educating veterinary/scientific audiences (e.g. vets/nurses in practice, academics). Students can enrol in their third year, with completion over the final three years of the veterinary degree

Twenty nine of our 160 third year students (2014/15) enrolled in this optional programme have successfully completed the first year of the Certificate and we have just enrolled the new 2015/16 third years into the programme; 43 out of this cohort of 161 have enrolled. Five of the 2014/15 intake have embarked on the Higher Education Academy Associate Fellowship application pathway.

1.2 Key performance points

Comment or where relevant provide information on the following, for the current year in relation to the previous 5 academic years. Please highlight where any specific programme or student group can be identified, and where rates fall below the relevant benchmark (see guidance), what is being done to address the issue. For actions that are on-going, please comment on their impact.

See guidance section for sources of data.

Undergraduate

1.

Course results: State proportion of A-D grades versus E-H grades (or grades from E and below as relevant).

[UG & PGT]

Average across all courses for 2014/15

• Pass at first sitting: 95%

• Fail: 5%

Course Comparison with previous results

Animal Body (GEP)

Pass % at first sitting

77%

Animal Health, Welfare and Food Safety

(AHWFS) (GEP)

91%

Similar pass rate each year. There is some variation but no trend either up or down in recent years (78% in 12/13, 80% in

13/14).

An upward trend has been ever established since the first year of the course when it was 60% (75% in 12/13, 85% in 14/15).

Professional and Clinical

Skills (GEP)

100% Consistently high results over the past five years (91% in 13/14).

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Animal Body 1

Animal Body 2

92%

88%

Consistent with previous 5 years where lowest pass rate has been 80%.

This year a little higher pass rate than last year (87% in 13/14 and 90% in 12/13) but not inconsistent with minor variation in previous years.

Fits within trend of previous 5 years (range of 86% - 97%).


(AHWFS) 1


Skills 1

Animal Body 3

90%

97%

95%

Animal Body 4 99%


(AHWFS) 2


Skills 2

Student Selected

Component 1

Veterinary Pathology

90%

99%

100%

99%

Clinical Foundation

Course (CFC)

Dog and Cat

96%

92%


Skills 3

Farm Animal

99%

96%

Identical to 13/14. There has been an improving pass rate in the

5 years of this course from 90%.

Lower than last year (99% in 13/14) but consistent with the range and trends over the previous 5 years. Rates ranged from

90-97%.

Consistent with previous years where the pass rate is always high (100% in 13/14).

Same rate as 13/14 and consistent with previous 4 years, which showed an improvement from 69% in the first year the course was run.

This has been consistent with the previous 5 years, which have shown an improvement from the 84% pass in 2009/2010.

Consistent with previous years. This a pass/fail course with no grade award.

Consistently high pass rate at 1 st sitting ranging from 90-100% since the course began.

The trend continues upward: there has been a consistent pattern of improving pass rates from 57% initially to 84% in

13/14.

There has been some variation in the pass rate for this course

(14/15 saw a slight drop from 94% in 13/14) but the current results fit within the recent trends.

Consistent over the 4 cycles to date.

Equine

Exotics

98%

96%

Veterinary Public Health

(previously AHWFS 4)

96%


Skills 4

97%

The highest pass rate ever attained (previous 5 years 82, 76, 71,

75, 80). The course experienced some problems in 12/13 and

13/14 and the resolution of these has likely contributed to the higher pass rate in 14/15.

Commensurate with rates for previous 2 years (99 & 94). This course commenced in 12/13.

A slight drop compared with previous two years (99 & 98). This course commenced in 12/13.

An improvement on 13/14 (87%) and more in line with trends from 12/13 and 11/12 (98 and 93). This course experienced similar problems to Farm Animal in 13/14 which have now been resolved, contributing to a higher pass rate in line with former years.

Very similar to previous 4 years.

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Final Year course 100%

99%

Major changes to course and assessment this year (see 1.1)

Comparison with previous years inappropriate.

Consistent with previous years (98 in 13/14). Student Selected

Component 2

Professional

Development course **

91% 2013/14 – 100%. Few students enrolled. Non-credit bearing course.

** This course provides general support and advice on personal and professional development. All students who are repeating a year or part year with no special circumstances award in previous academic year i.e. normally those that are required to attend all classes are required to take this course and must pass in order to progress (in addition to their re-sitting course(s)).

2.

Comment on the above including proposed actions if the proportion of grades A-D or E-H is higher than expected and briefly state actions taken or planned to address any issues of concern. [UG]

The pass rate for the majority of courses has been consistent with previous years (and in some cases shows noticeable improvement). The vast majority of students who fail the first sitting pass at their second attempt.

3.

Comment on any significant variations or persistent issues in the last 5 year trend in student achievement and any reasons identified. [UG]

The percentage of passes has remained similar for most courses. The distribution of fails between grades E and G has remained fairly consistent.

The increasing trend of pass percentage in AHWFS GEP is encouraging. This reflects the re-organisation of the course structure, integration and alignment with the AHWFS 1 and 2 courses of the 5 year programme and shift of more teaching to earlier in the year.

The increasing trend of pass percentage in CFC course is encouraging and reflects the work carried out on the course structure by the teaching team and the continued integration of evidence based medicine teaching first introduced in 2013/14.

Problems with scheduling of pre/ post-Christmas exams and relocation of course content affecting the

Vet Public Health (previously AHWFS 4) and Farm Animal courses in 13/14 (see Annual Report 13/14

1.2.3 for details) has been rectified for 14/15, which is likely to have contributed to the higher pass rates for these courses in 14/15.

4.

Comment on withdrawal rate in relation to the College average [see guidance], including any trends, and identify actions needed or being taken if the rate is of concern to the School. [UG]

The withdrawal rate for the School is consistently low and for session 2014/15 was a total of 14 students: Year GEP (3 students), Year 1 (3 students), Year 2 (3 students) and Year 4 (5 students). This is less than 2% of the whole student body for 2014/15. There were no withdrawals in Year 3 or Final Year.

Of the 14 withdrawals, 1 transferred to another programme within UOE, 1 transferred to another institution, 3 graduated with a BSc Veterinary Science, 1 with a Diploma in Veterinary Science and the remaining 8 withdrew to unspecified ‘personal reasons’ (which usually include health, financial, family and welfare issues). SECTION 4 TBC.

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5.

Proportion of entrants who have successfully achieved an award. [UG]

The pass rate for those students who sat finals in 2014/15 was 100%. A total of 157 were awarded a

BVM&S Veterinary degree in July 2015. This graduating group will include some who have intercalated, suspended studies or repeated years at some point throughout their time at vet school. 114 entrants joined the 5 year programme in 2010/11 and 60 joined the 4 year programme in 2011/12. Of these a total of 28 (16.9%) have either repeated a full or part year or have Intercalated. Of the remaining 146,

90% (131) graduated with a BVM&S degree, 6 had been previously awarded a Veterinary Science

Certificate, Diploma or other degree and 9 had withdrawn completely.

6.

Any notable change in degree classifications in relation to the past 5 years, including notable divergence from Russell Group degree classification data. [UG] For College of Medicine and

Veterinary Medicine, state any issue raised by regulatory bodies in relation to comparator information and performance in subsequent postgraduate examinations, and state follow up action being taken or planned [UG].

N/A. No degree classifications are awarded for the BVM&S degree. No issues were raised by regulatory bodies (RCVS and AVMA) where performance data is reported in annual returns.

7.

Any notable change in successful achievement of award by taught postgraduate students.

N/A.

8.

In relation to the University’s Strategic Plan target of the creation of at least 800 new opportunities for students to study abroad as part of their degree, state number of students going abroad as part of their degree, together with trend numerically [UG]. If proportion of students going abroad is increasing, briefly state what actions are being used successfully to promote study abroad.

BVM&S undergraduate students do not carry out any required formal study abroad as part of the programme. However, a number of students do carry out their credit-bearing Student Selected

Component 2 research projects overseas (9 students in 2014/15).

In addition there is a requirement for all students to undertake 38 weeks of Extra Mural Studies (EMS) within a range of clinical and non-clinical environments. Although this is a requirement for the degree and therefore students are monitored for compliance, it is arranged by the individual student, many of whom choose to undertake placements abroad, often in their home country. Only a small percentage of the 38 week EMS requirement must be completed in the UK which leaves significant scope for students to follow areas of interest by seeking work experience placements abroad. The School offers the opportunity for 5 final year students to spend 4 weeks on rotations at Colorado State University Vet

School as part of their EMS experience. Each year the School also provides 15 bursaries of up to £500 to assist with EMS expenses.

9.

State where the School has exceeded performance in the recruitment of Widening Participation students within the recruitment context of the School, as reported in the University’s Outcome agreement. Comment on the specific reasons identified for success e.g. participants in summer school. [UG]

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For 2015 entry, Widening Participation figures were as follows: 16 applied (20 for entry 2014), 16 were interviewed and 7 offered places with 7 accepting (6 accepted last year). This shows a 20% decrease in the number of WP applicants received for the BVM&S programme, but a 17% increase in WP entrants compared with last year. The number of WP applicants has remained fairly consistent across the last 3 years given the number of places available and WP applicants are small. This is in the context of 39

Scottish and EU places being made available for entry to the BVM&S in September 2015.

The entry requirements for students applying through the University’s Widening Participation project, although still at a high academic level, provide more flexibility than the standard requirements. This recognises discrepancies in the take-up of higher education from pupils from different social, cultural and educational backgrounds. Further concessions may be given to applicants with regard to their animal husbandry and veterinary work experience, based on difficulties acquiring placements, reduced opportunities or inappropriate advice from schools.

There was a continuation in WP activity this year with the Primary and early Secondary Years Initiative held in May (fourth year of running this). There was also a continued involvement in Pathways events:

‘So You Want to be a Vet?’ Pathways Parents Evenings, Work Observation Programme at Langhill Farm which aim to engage with prospective students, their families and advisers.

One educational strand of the UG Certificate in Veterinary Medical Education at Edinburgh introduced in

13/14, as reported last year, is the opportunity for veterinary students to become involved in admissions activities such as Widening Participation workshops and school visits to foster the link with young people aspiring to enter Higher Education. Students are also involved in visits to local authority schools to help run clinical workshops and work with LEAPS (Lothian Equal Access Programme for Schools) as student volunteers to provide workshops in schools to promote Higher Education and as student volunteers to be a Veterinary advocate at the S5 or S6 Conference at the University of Edinburgh.

10.

Report on any known issues arising from differences in student performance, for example degree outcomes in relation to gender, ethnicity and age. [UG]

Our numbers for gender and age have been steady for some years. The gender division for entrants in

2014/15 was 85% female:15% male. This is similar to the previous 5 years (range 81-85% female entrants) and reflects the proportion of applicants from each group. This high proportion of female applicants and entrants has been static for many years not only at Edinburgh but through the UK and other vet schools in many countries around the world.

There is a good breadth of age of entrants which has been similar for each of the past 6 years. This is the result of having both a 5 year and Graduate Entry Programme and our encouragement of applicants wishing to make a career change. Due to the global appeal of both our programmes we have an ethnically diverse population of students.

We monitor different groups of students throughout our programmes and not identified any differences in student performance between various groups.

11.

Report on student satisfaction with Personal Tutoring experience, against the KPI of 80% satisfaction. Report on how variations in Personal Tutor performance are being managed with a view to increasing student satisfaction. Where the KPI has not been met, outline action being taken.

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See 1.4

NSS – all core questions which could relate to satisfaction with Personal Tutor experience were at or above 80% and similar to those responses for 2014:

Academic support – 85%

Advice and support – 82%

Contact staff – 90%

Good advice – 80%

Personal development – 83%

ESES. Comparing and contrasting with the NSS results we see a correlation between both with broadly similar patterns or themes and concerns. (see 1.4).

PT-related primary themes: Academic advice and support 74% and Personal and Career development –

78%.

Some sub-theme questions are less pertinent to the role of our Personal Tutors as our undergraduates are required to take all courses so advice regarding course/academic choice is not relevant.

We will continue to develop the Personal Tutor network through further staff training delivered by the

Deputy Director of Student Affairs and the Student Experience Officer. Attendance at these sessions is monitored by the School. Over 97% of Personal Tutors in the School attended PT training in 2014/15.

Although we have had discussions at LTC and VMQAC about ways to monitor individual PT performance the School is also interested to see what measures or processes the central university may put in place.

MOOCs

13.

For Schools with MOOCs, provide a brief reflection on the School’s experience of providing MOOCs, and in particular any way in which its MOOC provision is informing its credit-bearing provision.

State total enrolment per MOOC and completion rate as a proportion of active users.

The Vet School moved the ‘EDIVET: Do you have what it takes to be a veterinarian?’ MOOC (non-credit bearing) to Coursera’s on-demand platform on 16 th June 2015 – this means that rather than running at specific times of the year the MOOC is available at any time for students to enroll on and work through the content. Since moving to this new platform the data on 22 nd October 2015 showed there were 5,432 enrolled learners and 402 completing the course to date. 44% of the participants were from North

America and 25% from Europe. Females have made up 63% of the cohort with around 30% aged 25-34.

Link: https://www.coursera.org/course/edivet . Video content produced for the MOOC continues to be used as a resource in the BVM&S programme.

1.3 External Examiner reports and actions taken in response

Undergraduate

1.

What proportion of External Examiner reports have been received at this point and what action is being taken to follow up outstanding reports?

100% of 14/15 reports were received.

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The new External Examiner Online Reporting system (EERS) was launched in April 2015 and External

Examiners engaged well with it and offered feedback on using it. A number of reports were submitted ‘offline’ as these reports were received prior to the rollout of the system (the earliest reports are submitted in January for Semester 1 courses).

Difficulties arose due to having a number of External Examiners who act as External for multiple courses: the EERS system allows only one report to be submitted per External, which is not ideal when an External must answer Yes/ No questions and offer feedback on more than one course in the same report. It is hoped that user feedback to the project team on this issue will encourage system improvements for future use.

2.

Has the proportion of reports received improved on the final point in the previous year?

Yes. In 13/14, 97% of reports were received (35 out of 36). Unfortunately the missing report was never submitted despite repeated requests from staff (the External Examiner concerned was in his last year of appointment).

3.

What action has been taken if a 100% return rate has not been achieved?

N/A.

4.

Themes from External Examiner reports (including commendations, suggestions and issues) and actions taken in response, including any on-going remediation.

Following on from the model introduced in 12/13, the Director of Teaching, Year Directors, Director of QA and Veterinary Teaching Organisation (VTO) Manager met to review the External Examiners comments and Course Organiser responses for 2014/15, approve actions proposed and identify any broad themes needing further action. A summary document (below) was discussed at LTC and also then sent to External Examiners so they received not only Course Organiser responses to their individual suggestions but also were informed of the overall common themes captured from all external examiners across the programmes.

The Year Directors’ summaries and all External Examiners reports and Course Organisers’ responses are made available to staff, students and External Examiners via LEARN.

Relationships with our External Examiners continue to be constructive and helpful. Externals continue to be very positive about our exam board processes, standard setting and their role in the process.

LTC Response to External Examiners - Reflection on Session 14/15

The Director of Teaching, Year Directors, Director of QA, QA Administrator and VTO Administrator met to review the external examiners and course organiser responses for 2014/15 and identify themes needing further action during 2015/16.

Some EE reports were presented in the new format from the External Examiner Online Reporting

System (EERS) – these are available to review on EERS.

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The 5 themes that were common across many courses in 13/14 and action taken:

Improved exam statistics and standard setting. LTC and ASSET (The Assessment Executive) approved levels of standard setting for all courses. Training provided for Exam Board Chairs. Work in this area is ongoing under the remit of ASSET.

External examiners to receive copies of model answers and final draft of exam papers. This was adopted and will continue in 2015/16.

Reviewing questions from statistics. BoE training was held to assist in identifying poorly performing questions. Sessions will be repeated in 2015/16. ASSET have provided support in helping courses manage the storage of their question banks and will continue to work on rolling out Speedwell which will assist in matching statistics with question performance and allow questions to be tagged/grouped according to their performance.

Question writing training. Through the work of ASSET the LTC supported the recommendation that all staff attend the VMED workshops on question writing and writing learning objectives.

Annotating scripts and model answers. LTC provided guidance to markers and will reiterate the message when developing the use of the fail sheets for feedback.

The 4 themes that were common across many courses in 14/15:

Use of fail sheets for feedback. Following on the university requirement to improve quality and speed of feedback the programme will continue to encourage the use of the sheets. Improvements to the sheets will be put in place which will ensure markers provide comments on either the feedback sheet or on the script and the feedback sheet. The programme will also be focussing on

“Leading Enhancement in Assessment and Feedback” (LEAF) which enables programme teams to capture the typical experience of feedback and assessment on their programme using the

“Transforming the Experience of Students through Assessment” (TESTA) methodology. This ties in with the overall University focus on quality as well as timeliness of feedback.

Standard setting. We are grateful for the continued constructive and supportive comments in this area by our externals, many of whom acknowledge the challenges given there is no perfect system.

Work continues on using Hofstee to standard set the exams and is being used on all courses. The boundaries set for the programme are 0-10/15% fail rate and 48-52% fail range. The Assessment

Executive (ASSET) continue to oversee and review standard setting in the programme and will be making recommendations to a forthcoming LTC.

Comments from External Examiners leading to course changes. We are grateful for the continued input of our externals not only on the examinations per se but the overall course content and level.

Externals feedback has contributed to discussions at post course review level and has contributed to changes being made to:

SSC1: change to students research component (foundation)

AB3: reduction in overall amount of assessment

AB1 and AB2: will inform discussions on revising course content

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Balance between exam components. The perception of the difficulty of some assessment components over others has led to discussions on rebalancing of relative weightings of components in several courses e.g. Vet Pathology and CFC

The School has not yet received any feedback from College or University regarding themes captured via the new EERS.

1.4 Student Engagement

1.

Highlight significant issues arising from student feedback, including student-staff liaison committees, course monitoring, ESES, NSS, PTES and PRES, indicating where relevant if it relates to a specific programme.

2.

Indicate action planned by the School.

3.

Evaluate effectiveness of mechanisms used for obtaining and responding to feedback from students, including feedback from on-line non-credit courses (including MOOCs).

4.

OPTIONAL: Include if wished a reflection from student representatives or other configurations of the student voice on student engagement and its effectiveness.

NSS ad ESES 2015

In 2014/15 the School continued its emphasis on developing and evaluating the student experience in response both to the NSS and the high demands of the Programme in terms of time and academic and professional skills. We will continue with efforts to improve in all area and both the NSS and ESES results have been discussed at LTC and VMQAC.

NSS results compared 2015 responses against 2014 results. The School response rate increased by

13% to 88%. Overall satisfaction dropped 3% from 2014 (down to 90% from 93%). Satisfaction dropped slightly from 2014 in the following categories: Assessment & Feedback (-2%); Organisation

& Management (-7%); Learning Resources (-1%); Personal Development (-2%). Satisfaction increased by 1% in the areas of Teaching and Academic Support.

Only one metric showed variation beyond expected ‘noise’ around a reported percentage and that was for Organisation and Management. It is possible that the 7% drop in Organisation &

Management resulted partly from some issues experienced during the move from using EEVeC to

LEARN for course delivery (this necessitated a transition period during which two different VLE’s were in use). Significant work was put into this area in preparation for the start of academic year

2015 to ensure an improved user experience and to provide students (and staff) with more comprehensive guidance on using LEARN for course materials and general programme information.

The BVM&S Student Handbook was significantly revised ahead of session 2014/15. High turnover in administrative staff in the UG area over 2014 may also have had an impact: happily, staffing levels have now settled and have remained steady in 2015.

The School response to the ESES for 14/15 returned a significantly higher response rate of 44.6% this year, compared with only 21.5% in 13/14, due in large part to the efforts of the Student Experience

Officer and other staff in promoting the survey. Broadly speaking, results across all areas were positive and there were some small improvements in 7 of the 10 categories surveyed. In comparing and contrasting the NSS data with the ESES results there was a correlation between both, with a broadly similar pattern of themes and concerns emerging from both sets of survey results. ESES free

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& Enhancement Report 2014/15 text comments showed that students particularly appreciate the following aspects of the BVM&S programme: o A community feeling o The friendly staff o Freedom of independent study o Meeting new people through the Sports & Societies o EMS Placements experience

The School continues to work hard to assure students that they were listened to and their feedback was considered and responded to via the ‘What matters to you?’ and ‘You Said, We Did …’ campaign.

Student Feedback and End of Course Surveys

The following actions for improving feedback to students were identified in 13/14 and implemented as planned in 14/15:

• Producing printed materials (fliers/ bookmarks) listing changes made each year in response to student feedback, highlighting key changes for each year group.

• Holding a post-exam discussion with students to explain how exam boards were run and assessments reviewed.

• Introductory sessions at the start of each academic year which would include a summary of changes made since the previous year as a result of student feedback.

• Publicising the actual number of respondents to an individual survey question (i.e. ‘only 3 students of a total 150 students felt that x was a problem’.)

Student feedback is obtained formally through Staff Student Liaison Committees and end of course surveys and on a more flexible basis through discussion between the Veterinary Students Council, the Director of UG Teaching, the student representatives and the year administrators. Via the

Student Voice “You said, We Did ….” And the ‘What Matters to You?’ campaigns, students can give feedback individually by completing anonymous feedback slips. Comments raised by students and

School responses are published via LEARN and used in the preparation of hard copy materials distributed within the School (i.e. menu cards/ School handbook).

Efforts continue to try to raise the response rate to end of course surveys, which continues to be poor (see 1.1 and comments regarding the introduction of EVASYS in Section 1.1).

The School continued with the system for Course Tracking Analysis introduced in 13/14. A comparison of course survey responses across all courses, by means of a ‘traffic light’ system is presented to Learning & Teaching Committee over the summer, with Course Organisers presenting a commentary on their course results and the opportunity to discuss best practice and share ideas.

We continue to strive to meet the requirement on formative feedback turnaround time, as per

Taught Assessment Regulation 15. For each course the following are published to Students via the

14



LEARN course page: date of in-course assessment (ICA) & date for return of feedback & marks (if not supplied by Course Organiser – then calculated as 15 working days after ICA/ submission date). The dates for submission and return are recorded by the VTO staff to ensure the requirement is met.

The School continues to be aware that there is the potential for some tensions between the two programme cohorts (5 year and Graduate Entry) especially at the time they become one programme and cohort for the final three years. The School has responded by timetabling more classes together in the early years of both programmes culminating in all classes post-Easter break prior to the combination of the programmes being taught together. This appears to be paying dividend. Informal feedback indicates this tension was less of a concern in 2014/15.

Student Community & Support

We continue with a variety of now well-established systems with the aim of encouraging community and peer-relationship building among our students, including the R(D)SVS House System, the Dick

Vet Peer Support programme and the highly successful VetPALS scheme. We also offer in-house

Study Skills support.

In response to student feedback the School introduced a ‘White coat ceremony’ in 2013/14. The

School has developed this idea and now all new students, GEP and year, are invited to attend the ceremony at one time. It is a similar format to the graduation ceremony: individuals are called up, welcomed by the Head of School, presented with a certificate and white coat embroidered with the

School crest and finally, as a group, the students are welcomed to the Dick Vet family and the veterinary profession by repeating an oath-like statement. Photo-opportunities are then available, organised by the School. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AyJlyZHe0ZY&feature=youtu.be

Mechanisms for obtaining feedback from R(D)SVS MOOCs

Original mechanism was an end of the course survey – this followed the standard Ed Uni MOOC end of course survey with the addition of 2 questions relating to participant views on whether this had helped them to decide whether to be a Vet or not (not really relevant to the course evaluation) – questions included rating the pace, length, etc of the MOOC plus free-text comments as well. There was also a discussion forum that participants could post about issues that could be deal with as they arose (there was no email contact or email details provided). From 2015/16 it went to an on-demand system.

1.5 Annual Monitoring

Course and Programme – All Credit-bearing Undergraduate Provision

1.

Outline briefly the process for course and/or programme monitoring.

2.

Course level: Has annual monitoring been conducted for all credit-bearing courses?

3.

If annual monitoring of courses has not been carried out, why is this, and what follow-up action is being taken?

4.

Identify the key themes from annual monitoring in 2 categories:

15





Positives



Issues identified for improvement and how these will be taken forward

The BVM&S QA Committee meets 4 times per year at times that reflect appropriate periods in the academic and QA cycle (see Appendix 1). The annual cycle of internal monitoring continues as last year and comprises individual reviews of all credit-bearing courses and annual reviews from the areas of teaching, admissions, library, student experience and the VTO.

Each course is reviewed by the students, course teaching staff, course organiser, External Examiner and by a member of the Quality Assurance committee (Independent Reviewers). Each Independent

Reviewer is assigned a small number of courses with which they have no involvement in a teaching capacity. They are provided with a suite of standard documents per course to assist them in their review. These include:

•

•

•

•

•

•

Staff Student Liaison committee meeting minutes

End of Course survey (data and redacted free text comments)

Post Course Review minutes

Examination Board minutes

External Examiners report(s)

Reflective Summary by the Course Organiser (see Appendix 2)

Reviewers complete an Independent Review Form on completion of their review (see Appendix 3), which is used in preparation of the Annual QA Report and as a resource for the creation of a

Summary Themes document which is discussed by both VMQAC and LTC.

QA monitoring documentation is reviewed each year for ease of use, clarity and any gaps in information. In the last two years, particular emphasis was made in asking Course Organisers to reference course delivery to the previous year and ‘closing the loop’ between any planned changes and what was actually implemented the following year.

In general the completion and submission of all course QA documentation was prompt and complete, adhering to the deadlines provided to staff for the return of documentation. There were some missing documents due to high staff turnover in a couple of areas. The requirement for documentation to be completed and submitted closer to the completion of each course for those running in semester one has worked well on 2014/15.

As last year, the QA remit, process and all documentation is available to staff and students via

LEARN. Completed QA documents are organised by session year, year of programme and individual course so are easy to locate.

External monitoring is delivered through the Teaching Programme Review, National Student Survey and the reports following the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons/ EAEVE and AVMA visitations and

Annual reports to these organisations. A full International Accreditation visit by RCVS/

AVMA/EAEVE/AVBC took place in November 2015. Formal outcome of this visitation is expected in

March-May 2016. The next BVM&S Teaching Programme Review will take place in March 2016.

16



The joint Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons (RCVS), AVMA (American Veterinary Medical

Association) and EAEVE (European Association of Establishments for Veterinary Education) visitation is a critical review, carried out on a cycle of approximately eight years, which determines if the quality of teaching, course content, facilities and rigour of the assessment process is sufficient to meet the standards of these PRSB’s and ‘sufficiently guarantee that persons registered in the register will have acquired the knowledge and skill needed for the efficient practice of veterinary surgery’.

1.6 Internal Subject Review (TPR)

1.

Attach annual report of progress with recommendations for individual reviews until all completed.

The last TPR was completed in February 2010.

The next TPR will take place in March 2016.

2.

Reflect on impact of actions taken to date.

Please see TPR - Summary Report on Completion of Recommendations in Appendix 4

1.7 Reviews by accrediting and professional bodies

1.

Report any review by an accrediting or professional body which has taken place since the last annual report and confirm the outcome (attach the outcome letter or other documentation).

None. Routine annual interim reports submitted for AVMA and RCVS.

A full International Accreditation visit by RCVS/ AVMA/EAEVE/AVBC took place in November 2015.

Formal outcome of this visitation is expected in March-May 2016.

2.

Note any recommendations or actions which have an impact beyond the School.

N/A.

1.8 Collaborative Arrangements (including placements and study abroad partnerships)

1.

Has the School entered into any new collaborative teaching arrangement/s in which part or all of a programme of study is provided by a partner institution either in the UK or abroad

leading to an award by the University of Edinburgh either wholly or in joint names? NO

2.

If Y, state title of award or nature of collaboration (e.g. new study abroad partnership), and

whether notified to Governance and Strategic Planning. N/A

17



In addition to the very successful collaboration with Inglis Veterinary Centre in Cowdenbeath delivering one week core rotations to all final years as reported last year we have now introduced a 3 week selected rotation choice option at Inglis available after Winter break.

3.

Have any issues arisen from existing collaborative arrangements? NO

4.

Are any changes foreseen which are likely to require changes to existing agreements? NO

5.

Are there any issues of wider concern to the College/University arising from collaborative

arrangements? NO

1.9 Any other issues (optional)

Reflect on any issues emerging from the School’s quality assurance processes not covered by the sections above.

Nothing further to report.

2.

Quality Enhancement

Reflect on good practice identified through annual monitoring, student feedback/surveys or other mechanisms, including the impact of actions which have worked well and how this impact has been evaluated. Please include name of contact for follow up.

Internal and external reports over the last few years have been encouraging about the standard of teaching, assessment, facilities and responsiveness of course organisers to feedback. There is a continued need to enhance student feedback both on assessment but also in response to feedback regarding teaching, organisation, facilities etc.

Encouraging and sharing good practice:



Staff development programme continues to expand. The School delivered 41 in-house workshops in 2014/15, some unique others duplicated, with a combined total of 219 participants



In collaboration with IAD, we have also aligned our staff development with the Edinburgh

Teaching Award (EDTA) and are mentoring our first group of staff through this process aligned either to FHEA or SFHEA.



Regular journal club on teaching/ learning related content and staff presentations on their research continue



Large presence of the VMED team at the VETED conference in Cambridge with more than 10 presentations delivered and 2 workshops



A new initiative this year which went very well was a ‘course organiser’s away day’ where we talked about strategy and general issues relating to teaching and learning in the school.

18



Feedback from the event was very positive and we will run again next year aiming of expand to any colleagues interested in attending.



We continue to send at least one staff member each year to a major assessment course which is run annually by the medical education community.

Our exam board processes continue to be fine-tuned, including the implementation of a standard exam board agenda and exam board process flowchart. We continue to develop this area further.

(see Appendix 5)

The new BVM&S Assessment Executive (ASSET) was established in July 2014 with the remit to facilitate and audit programme-wide compliance with pre-defined requirements in relation to assessment methods, course design, QA and standard setting. ASSET works closely with course teams to ensure robust learning outcomes are defined and blueprinted to RCVS Day one

Competencies, to monitor and refine assessment methods, to develop and trial appropriate methods of standard setting and to monitor training available for examiners and question writing. In 14/15, the Hofstee standard setting method was introduced for all courses; in 15/16, new methods such as

Ebel and Cohen will be trialled. The purchase of Speedwell software in summer 2015 has allowed

ASSET to pilot the use of exam question banks and it is hoped that the software can be used to produce exam papers (MCQ’s) once a sufficient bank of questions and associated performance data has been established in Speedwell. The assessment process has evolved in response to comments from external examiners, continued engagement with best practice and increased efforts in staff development associated with assessment and standard setting.

There is continued monitoring of our QA processes: a dialogue between the BVM&S Learning and

Teaching committee and the VMQAC ensures yearly QA themes are identified and acted upon and there is ongoing refinement of the QA process and documentation.

In the area of UG Admissions, 2014/15 saw the continuation of the Multiple Mini Interviews (MMI’s) for all part-funded places. This process was extended to ensure all candidates for full-fee places

Were also interviewed using the same format either in Edinburgh or overseas in Asia or U.S.A.

Positive feedback was again received from both candidates and interviewers. This form of interview is recognised as more reliable and valid than the more traditional panel interview. It is less reliant on a large time commitment from a small number of interviewers, gives staff more ownership and engagement with the selection of vet students and is perceived more favourably by prospective students and enhances the reputation of the School.

Our Clinical Skills facilities and curriculum underwent further expansion and improvement in

2014/15 and work continues on monitoring these. More classes have been scheduled as part of our core curriculum to enhance our teaching of clinical skills and student preparation for EMS.

The Lady Smith of Kelvin Veterinary Library The Lady Smith of Kelvin Veterinary Library (LSoKVL) is staffed from 9am to 6pm, Monday to Friday, during semester. Students can swipe in and use the

Library between 8am and 9am and 6pm and 10pm during the week. At the weekends students can swipe in and use the Library from 8am to 10pm.

The gate count at the LSoKVL for 2014-15 was 65,054.

19



The Library’s new discovery service, ‘DiscoverEd’ replaces both the Library Catalogue and Searcher and is now the principal search tool for finding and accessing books, ebooks and ejournals. Users get a weekly account summary. Users can link to their library account from MyEd. Users entitled to extended loan period, for accessibility reasons, are no longer required to visit Helpdesks to facilitate this – this is now automated at the self-issue machines and will be automatically applied to all renewals.

UG students can now borrow up to 30 books at one time (previously 25).

Students can request free scans of articles from print journals held elsewhere in the University of

Edinburgh Library. Scans are emailed to students and can be requested and received when students are away from campus. Books held elsewhere in the University of Edinburgh Library can also be requested using this service and students can collect them from the LSoKVL.

Students can use the Library ‘Request a Book’ Service (RAB) to recommend books which they think should be purchased for the Library. So far all books recommended by students have been purchased.

The LSoKVL purchases books and journals, in print and electronic format, and AV material and online databases. The Library makes resources available electronically as part of a College supported strategic migration to online provision depending on availability and within the budget allocation.

The Library continued its subscription to Vet Record Case Reports, VetMed Resource, BioOne and to

JoVE (the Journal of Visualized Experiments), increasing the resources available to students offcampus.

In 2014-15 the LSoKVL added 432 new books to the collection. Individual ebooks were purchased, but most ebooks are sourced through ‘bundle’ publisher collections.

The LSoKVL continues to purchase copies of high demand textbooks for the HUB collection in the

Main Library. Students who do not wish to use the Veterinary Library in the evenings and at weekends have access to veterinary books in the University’s Main Library in the central campus area.

The Library continues to use Talis Aspire to surface resource lists for students. Resource Lists @

Edinburgh (using Talis Aspire) is a dynamic way for teaching staff to manage reading lists and provide students with easy access to key resources. Over the last year 29 undergraduate veterinary lists have been added.

General Contact: Claire.Phillips@ed.ac.uk

3.

Engagement with Strategy

1.

Report on key priorities as outlined in the School Learning and Teaching Enhancement

Strategy, or the sections of the School annual plan relevant to UG provision. Schools may wish to reference University priorities which influence School strategies.

2.

Reflect on engagement with the University’s current priority theme:

20





Improvement of the Student Experience, focussing the five key areas outlined in the

Student Experience leaflet summer 2013: community, engagement, support, feedback and recognition.

3.

How has the implementation of these recent developments impacted on staff and students?

4.

Comment on potential enhancements at College or University level that could be made to support Schools’ implementation of strategic developments, either in general or in relation to current projects (optional).

Key Priorities in 14/15

The following have been referred to throughout this report. In summary:

1) monitoring assessment standards and methods via the work of ASSET (see section 2);

2) recording and monitoring the return of feedback to meet the requirements of TAR 15;

3) continuing to improve communication with students to ‘close the loop’ on their feedback i.e. the

‘You Said, We Did ..’ campaign and provision of hard copy materials such as regularly updated menu cards in the Vet School cafeteria;

4) efforts were made towards achieving a higher response rate to course surveys and course survey tracking analysis, using a ‘traffic light system’ to ensure areas of concern are addressed by course teams;

5) the development of LEARN as the primary VLE for delivery of UG course materials and enhanced communication with staff and students to ensure accessibility and use of materials is understood;

6) continued emphasis on an effective and open dialogue between staff and student

representatives/ Veterinary Student Council

7) ongoing work on EMS placements and experience logs. A system is being developed using Pebble

+ to allow student to record their EMS experiences, mapped to RCVS and AVMA competencies

8) the creation of a new Final Year Committee to have oversight of rotations and final exams.

9) UG Progression Boards: successful implementation of individual Year Progression Boards as per the new Central University requirement. This process sits alongside (although remains separate from) our existing Exam Boards and Progression Committees.

The BVM&S Student Experience 14/15

The new Student Experience Officer post-holder reinvigorated the area of student support and saw new initiatives rolled out with enthusiasm:

1. Student Support and Management Group now meet monthly. Topics since January 2015 have included:





What Matters to You? feedback mechanism re-launch

Development and implementation of exam script viewing protocol for Personal

Tutors and students.



Suicide threats: working with student counselling service to strengthen school response to threatened suicide.

21





ADHD: working with student disability to strengthen school response to students with ADHD by providing a ‘named contact’ to support students & staff.



Continued strengthening Eating Disorders (EDs) guidance for students and staff.

2. Continued development of the Personal Tutor network through further staff training delivered by the Deputy Director of Student affairs and the Student Experience officer (see 1.2.11).

3. Greater engagement with College and University level group SSIG, resulting in greater alignment and understanding of University, College and School strategic objectives.

4. The generation of modest increases on 2014 results for NSS and ESES survey responses resulting in meeting the institutional target of 75% and 44% respectively.

5. Continued strengthening of relationships with the VSC by the Director of Teaching, Director of

Student affairs, and Student Experience Officer. Valuable data gathered from actual student responses leading to changes in welcome week and student welfare week.

6. Fully supporting the integration of 5 Ways to Wellbeing in the Professional & Clinical Skills portfolios. Reaching out to University departments to help us turn proposed wellbeing activities into actions: for example, engaging with the University Chaplaincy to explore opportunities for collaborative activities of student well-being.

7. Developing links with Therapets Canine Concern Scotland to improve student well-being and to provide links with the retired animal care community and their friends.

8. Working to strengthen links with future employers. Hosted first school level careers fair in March

2015 for 7 major UK Vet corporates to attend and pitch their graduate schemes to students.

9. Continuing to strengthen the school and student relationships with EUSA by including EUSA staff in induction and welfare activities, and providing platforms for continued feedback.

10. Continually reflecting on our progress and looking for new ways to enhance the student experience. For example, remodelling our welcome week activity for Graduate Entry students to recognise that we understand although technically they are undergraduates they may have more postgraduate experience expectations.

11 In-house Study Skills support for students: the Vet School study skills team are available on a rota basis to meet students individually to support and advise.

12. The continuation of the VETPALS system alongside the peer support programme. Both running very successfully and adding to the sense of a supportive student community in the school. The Peer

Support Scheme is now recognised by the Edinburgh Award. The EUSA impact award for the Best

Peer Assisted Learning Scheme was awarded for the work developing peer support (VETPALS) in the vet school.

13. The ongoing opportunity for our veterinary students to become involved in admissions activities such as Widening Participation workshops and school visits to foster the link with young people aspiring to enter Higher Education. (see 1.2.9 – Widening Participation)

22



14. Vet Student Ambassadors. An increasing number of vet students from all years and both programmes are involved in the outward face of the Vet School. They are involved in Open Days,

Interview Days, Offer conversion Activities. These contributions will be acknowledged on transcripts.

For additional information, see section 1.4 (Student Engagement).

4.

Opportunities identified for development and action

1.

Reflect on matters requiring attention, with a suggestion for the action required.

State whether the issue is for the attention of the School, College or University.

External Examiner Online Reporting System: request that project team take on board feedback from users to refine and improve the system; for example, the issue of external examiners covering multiple courses in one report. For the purposes of effective course level QA, it is impractical to ask an External Examiner a series of Y/N questions when they are required to refer to multiple courses in writing their report. UNIVERSITY

Mobile phone signal – this continues to be very patchy across the campus with a poor to absent signal in many areas. We will work to find a way to improve this. UNIVERSITY/SCHOOL/EXTERNAL

Timetable planning – despite a successful, if small, pilot in 2013/14 using the university timetable planner software we have yet to progress this further. We plan to work with colleagues in the central timetabling unit to progress this from pilot to functional use of the software in 2015/16.

SCHOOL/UNIVERSITY/COLLEGE

2.

Outline plans for further enhancing students’ Personal Tutoring experience.

We have developed a clear School Personal Tutoring Statement for 2015/16. See Appendix 6.

TO BE COMPLETED

5.

Engagement with annual reporting process

Reflect on the structure and/or content of this report template and, where relevant, make suggestions for how it can be improved.

Some sections appear to ask for a repeat of information which is also asked for elsewhere (i.e. 1.4 and 3.2 – Student Engagement).

QA Reports: the standard QA reports available on BI Suite, although much improved from previous years, are still missing information which are necessary for an accurate analysis of BVM&S course data. The report ‘Course Results’ which provides data on marks for First, Second and Final Attempts does not take into account students who take Resit attempts as First Sits (i.e. due to Special

Circumstances) which skews the data (we rely on in-house records to provide this data instead).

23



Dr Claire Phillips, BVM&S Director of Quality Assurance

Ms Susan Orr, Deputy Manager, Veterinary Teaching Organisation

Date of Approval:

24



MARCH-JUNE

 External Examiner Reports submitted via

EERS. Notification of submitted report automatically sent to Course Organisers &

Exam Board Chairs to access and read.

 Course Organiser Reflective Summary sent by SKC to CO’s for completion & returned to SKC as soon as Post Course

Review has taken place.

 Year Admins to ensure all relevant docs



 Single document of EE comments and CO responses collated by SKC and sent to

Year Directors. Included at August L&TC along with update from QAD.

AUGUST

 Independent course review by members of VMQAC.

SEPTEMBER

 VMQAC meets to discuss independent course review.



CMVM Head of Academic Administration and Director of QA meet with Assistant

Principal Academic Standards and Quality

Assurance (School QAD invited)

 Completed Independent Review forms &

Responses to External Examiners

(individual & collective) to be uploaded to

LEARN by SKC



School office holders send annual reports for upload to LEARN (Teaching/ Library/

VTO/ Admissions/ Student Experience)

OCTOBER

 QAD compiles annual School QA report for College and meets with CMVM Head of Academic Administration and Director of QA.



Annual QA Briefing (Academic Services)

Appendix 1 –

R(D)SVS

BVM&S Quality Assurance

Process

http://www.ed.ac.uk/schools-departments/academicservices/quality-unit/quality-assurance/annualmonitoring-reporting

AUGUST



Meeting of sub-group (Year Directors,

VTO Manager(s), Director of Teaching) to be convened to discuss collective & thematic response to EE/CO comments.

 Response to b prepared for Sept L&TC.

 Year Directors to respond to individual

External Examiner reports on EERS as

‘Academic Response Co-ordinators’ using info from CO Reflective Summaries .

SEPTEMBER

 L&TC receive and approve report from sub group meeting.

 Approved report to be sent to EE’s, CO’s,

EBC’s and Head of School.



Report to be uploaded to LEARN by SKC.

 Report included at subsequent College UG

Studies Committee.

OCTOBER-JANUARY



L&TC reviews and monitors agreed actions from previous QA cycle.



Final School QA Report to L&TC for information (by January).

FEBRUARY

 annual College Quality Assurance

Executive meeting to review individual

School reports

APRIL

 College QA report due at University Quality

Assurance Committee

Key

EERS – External Examiner Online Reporting

System

EE – External Examiner

SKC – School Key Contact (QA administrator)

CO – Course Organiser

EBC – Exam Board Chair

QAD – Director of Quality Assurance

L&TC – School Learning & Teaching

Committee

VMQAC – Veterinary Medicine Quality

Assurance Committee

25



Appendix 2: Course Organiser Reflective Summary Form 14/15

Course Name:

Date: Course organiser:

*Please note that all QA documents referred to in this form are available in the QA section of the all-staff-accessible

LEARN course ‘BVM&S Common Resources’. If you need guidance on where to locate a form or document, please email Susan.Orr@ed.ac.uk

1.

Student performance (pass rates, marks distribution) (completed by year administrator)

Number sitting first diet **:

Number passing at first diet **:

% Passing at first diet **:

% Distinctions at first diet:

Number taking the May/August exam as a resit:

Number taking the May/August exam as a 1st sitting:

** Figures should NOT include those awarded Special Circumstances and subsequently sitting in May/August as a

first sitting.

2.

I have read the Independent Course Review of this course for the preceding academic year available online (located within the QA folder of the LEARN course BVM&S Common Resources) please highlight - YES/ NO

3.

Comment on examination performance (pass rates, distribution, statistical evaluations applied and comparison with previous 2 years where appropriate)

4.

Comment on the implementation of the planned changes as detailed in last year’s Course Organiser Reflective summary form. In addition, if some planned changes have not been implemented please state why.

5.

Feedback from students (how is feedback collected? Were any actions taken during the most recent delivery of the course in response to feedback?)

26



6.

Feedback to students (how is feedback given: (a) in-course, (b)end of course)

7.

Teaching and learning provision (availability of staff, equipment, accommodation, concerns raised by students)

8.

Teaching and learning methods (range of methods, innovation and good practice)

9.

Assessment methods (overall pattern of assessment, in-course assessment, selection and approval of examination questions)

10.

External evaluation (Course organiser response to external examiners comments)

11.

Planned changes in teaching, learning and assessment for NEXT year (indicate how these originate i.e. are they in response to comments/feedback from students, external examiners or teaching staf

Appendix 3: Independent Course Review Form 14/15

Course Name:

Date course reviewed:

Reviewer:

1. All required documentation available at time of Independent Review [according to QA committee agreed list comprising 1) Course Handbook 2) SSLC minutes 3) Course Survey Results 4) Exam Board Minutes 5) External

27



Examiner Reports 6) Post Course Review Minutes 7) Course Organiser Reflective Summary from 14/15 8) Course

Organiser Reflective Summary from 13/14]

Yes No Missing documents:

2. Implementation of planned changes detailed last year in Course Organiser reflective summary (please tick) a. All changes implemented b. Some changes implemented c. No changes implemented

Comments:

3. Student performance (pass rates, distribution of marks, standard setting and trends )

Points of note from a. This year: b. Compared to previous 2 years:

4. Feedback from students (arising in Staff Student Liaison meetings (SSL) and Course survey results)

Has the Post course review discussed the Staff Student Liaison minutes and course survey results?

Yes No

From the SSL minutes, course survey results and course review … a. Praise: b. Issues: c. In response to feedback: Actions taken during the year being reviewed or planned for next academic year :

5. Feedback to students (methods of feedback on in-course work and end of course assessment)

Was feedback given as detailed in the course book? Yes No

List feedback methods actually used:

28



Comment on how feedback perceived by students (from SSL/course survey results):

6. Teaching and learning provision (availability of staff, equipment, accommodation)

7. External Examiner report(s) (issues of praise and issues of concern)

8. Planned changes in teaching, learning and assessment for the next academic year

9. Your overall assessment of responsiveness of course to student, staff and external comment

10. Innovation and good practice highlighted in any of the documentation for this course and comment on potential of relevance to other courses across the programme. a. Teaching and learning methods: b. Assessment: c. Feedback (both to and from students):

11. Issues / concerns potentially common to other courses across the programme:

29



30



Appendix 4: Summary Recommendations from TPR 2009/10

Recommendations:

3.8.a. The Review Team recommend that induction, training and mentoring of new DoSs should be formally and uniformly implemented and also be quality-assured by the School.

This has been implemented. All Personal Tutors have attended the induction (see details below) in the past 3 years

(with the exception of one person who has been unable to attend for a variety of reasons).

We now have 68 trained PTs with allocated students, plus 3 ‘new PTs who were trained in Oct 15 but have not yet been allocated any students (as allocations had already been done for this academic year)

The PT training is based around a 3 hour workshop format

New Personal Tutors:

Attend initial 1 hour session for overview and briefing about what the role involves. Short presentation delivered but the session is very discussion based, answering queries as they come up, and Student Experience Officer is also present throughout to answer queries

Learning objectives:

1.

Outline overall Student Support Programme at R(D)SVS

2.

Describe how Personal Tutor (PT) Scheme fits within this.

3.

Summarise key roles and responsibilities of a PT (and associated time commitments)

4.

Answer any questions/concerns from new PTs?

Existing PTs and new PTs:

The session above is then immediately followed by a 2 hour ‘Personal Tutor Update’, which existing PTs then join us for (so new PTS and existing PTs are all in the same room for this part of the session)

Colleagues from various support services join us and give a 5-10 min overview of their service and answer any queries from PTs

1.

Student Counselling Service

2.

Student Disability Service

3.

Advice Place

4.

Careers Service

5.

R(D)SVS Study Skills Team

6.

R(D)SVS Extra-mural Studies (EMS) coordinator

Presentation then given which covers key updates and important info (e.g. updated requirements for mandatory meetings) and answers any PT queries, and again Student Experience Officer is also present to answer any queries

Learning Objectives:

1.

List the mandatory meeting requirements for a PT

2.

Identify key contacts & referral options for Student Support

3.

Advise tutees appropriately regarding Special Circumstances applications

4.

Identify on-line resources for PTs (EUCLID and EEVEC)

5.

Outline the 'Note of Concern' system

6.

Recognise key recommendations regarding confidentiality of personal tutee information

5.9.b. The Review Team recommend that the School makes staff development workshops compulsory to teaching staff in order to improve teaching and learning. The Review Team also recommend that peer observations of teaching be introduced for new lecturers.

31



Two VMED ‘Support for Teaching workshops’ are now compulsory for all new staff to attend if they are involved in teaching R(D)SVS students

1) Staff Teaching Induction Workshop

2) Getting started with Learn workshop

These are both offered on a regular basis as part of a much larger rolling calendar of VMED ‘Support for Teaching workshops’

A programme of Peer observation of teaching has been piloted with volunteer colleagues over the past 6 months, and is now at the point of being rolled out on a wider basis within the school

The requirement to undertake this activity has also recently been embedded into the HR Induction information

‘checklist’ for new staff members involved in teaching R(D)SVS students.

This checklist also includes the requirement for any new colleague without an existing accredited FHEA status to enrol for the Edinburgh Teaching Award (which leads to AFHEA/FHEA/SFHEA/PFHEA status)

3.10. It is recommended that postgraduate tutors be given formal training and/or guidelines on the objective and methods of delivering tutorials with reference to student learning outcomes.

We run a bespoke training course for postgraduate tutors.

These ran on 7th March 2013, 11th September 2014, and 31 st August 2015.

The learning objectives for the session are below, and the relevant Powerpoint slides are attached

By the end of this session, you will be able to:

1.

Outline differences between the 5 and 4 year BVM&S programmes, and the students admitted to each of these.

2.

Outline the remit of the Veterinary Teaching Organisation (VTO) and Veterinary Medical Education Division

(VMED).

3.

Identify staff members responsible for different BVM&S year groups.

4.

Access useful teaching resources such as EEVEC and Learn

5.

Instigate appropriate action if you identify a student who is struggling on the BVM&S programme.

3.4. In light of staff and students comments on the need for improved IT support, the Review Team recommend that the level of IT support be reviewed.

A new IT support model, agreed and established between the University Information Services Group (ISG) and

CMVM Campus Administrators, is in place across CMVM since the start of 2014. Clear and concise information on the use of IS/IT, including how to obtain IT Help and support, is provided during student welcome week, staff induction and reference to Vet School and University web sites. The University now provides a “New Student” home page as an easily accessible focal point for all student support aspects and the newly formed Digital Skills and

Training section of ISG provide links to short IT related information videos as an additional support aid. The previous

IT/AV working group has been replaced by an advisory Learning and Technology group, comprising appropriate representation from the Vet School and ISG. This provides a two-way communication channel to facilitate the timely capture and response to evolving IS/IT requirements of the Learning and Teaching environment at the Vet School.

3.3c The Review Team recommend that the opening hours of the Library on the Easter Bush site be extended.

The *staffed* opening hours in the Lady Smith of Kelvin Veterinary Library are more than in the old EBVC Library, but less than in the old Summerhall Library.

32



*However*, students have better access to the library. The library is staffed between 9am and 6pm, but all students have access seven days a week from 8am to 10pm (a total of 98 hours). Final year students and students on clinical rotations can access the library 24/7 (they’re not meant to study in the library, but I think that’s a H&S issue and I’d be very happy to revisit it).

Prior to the library opening we had discussions with the School around the staffed opening hours. My recollection is that we didn’t want to suggest that students were expected to remain on campus, but giving them swipe access meant that they could use the library if they wanted to. I also have a recollection of the View being open until 8pm initially, but the opening hours being reduced as it wasn’t being used much.

Also, more material is available online than in 2010. The number of ejournal titles is probably fairly similar, but we have many more ebooks than we had then. This means that students have a lot more off campus access to materials than they had previously. I can pull together some figures, if that would be useful.

3.3a The Review Team recommend that Veterinary Medicine, in consultation with the College of Medicine and

Veterinary Medicine and the Estates and Buildings section of the University, address the issue of transport, and the

Team recommend that free transport links between the central area and Easter Bush site are provided.

Following a EUSA campaign the University approved a free bus service for Easter Bush students at peak times during term. It became apparent at an early stage however that such a free service could lead to a significantly reduced level of service compared to the current system as outlined below.

ISSUES



A free service could not be tailored to suit every student in the school in terms of where they live or their timetable/out of hours studying.



Reduction in users of LRT service could result in the school having to increase the contribution already paid to run the services to Easter Bush or cancellation of exsiting services.

AGREED SUPPORT FOR BUS SERVICE 2012/13



Following consultation with EUSA and VSC representatives there was agreement that the school would contribute to subsidised LRT bus pass.



A school contribution of £16 per month toward the bus pass was agreed. The balance between school and student contribution was calculated on the cost of monthly Direct Debit LRT bus pass taking into account the cost of single journey travel - twice a day for 5 days a week and the basis of the pass being valid 7 days a week and providing use outwith teaching times. This would mean a cost to students of £20/ month allowing travel on all LRT buses at any time.

AGREED SUPPORT FOR BUS SERVICE 2015/16



Bus passes now cost £40 a month by direct debit. We agreed to increase our contribution to £18 a month with the students expected to pay £22.

ONGOING ISSUES



Students continue to engage with the school on transport issues – including frequency of service and ability of service to support the number of students needing to use the service. The school liaises with the students and the transport office to ensure Lothian Buses are aware of service issues.

33



3.3b The Review Team recommend that the School in conjunction with the design team and Estates and Buildings should reconsider the siting of the new VTO office and student support services in the new building.

The VTO offices are based on the first floor of the teaching building – the VTO staff include 6 Year Administrators, an

EMS Administrator and the Student Experience Officer, all of whom provide frontline advice and support to the students (the Year Administrators act as Student Support Officers). The Student Experience Officer manages the outreach support provided by Counselling, Careers, EUSA and the Disability Office. Outreach is conducted in room

1.01 – next to the VTO.

3.7. The Review Team recommend that the School seeks additional sources of funding to provide additional bursaries and other forms of financial support to students.

In 2013/14 the school introduced bursaries for students required to repeat the year with approved special circumstances. Further bursaries are available for EMS and as detailed above the school is providing financial support for bus travel.

5.3.a. The Review Team recommend that the School encourages greater standardisation of the information that is uploaded to EEVeC.

AND

5.3.b. The Review Team also recommend that training sessions be provided to staff on the optimal use of EEVeC.

Following the TPR, improvements in EEVeC were made to both the instructions and training to staff and the appearance of the information. A liaison group between the school and LTS was put in place to address maintenance and development of the system. EEVeC has however now been replaced by LEARN which has a working group to ensure uniformity of appearance and regular in house training for staff.

4.6. The Review Team recommend that the School review the balance of induction in Freshers week to ensure that students are able to engage fully in all aspects of student life, including activities involving non-Veterinary Medicine students.

The Welcome Week has developed over time to ensure the correct focus during the students first week. The school scheduled welcome activities for part days on the first three days of the week and provided transport for the students to George Square after their activities. There were no activities scheduled on the last two days and the students were free to choose how to spend their time.

5.2.b. The Review Team also recommend that the results of the previous year’s evaluation forms and actions taken in response to them are included in all course handbooks.

AND

5.9.a The Review Team recommend that the School introduces a formal mechanism that deals directly with negative feedback that might be received from students regarding the quality of teaching delivered by individual members of staff.

The Learning & Teaching Committee approved the process for handling student responses to course surveys –



Survey results go to Course Organiser & LTC from Year Administrator

34





Course Organisers to review the free text comments, remove any unprofessional comments and forward comments on individual members of the course team to the individual and their line manager.



L&TC compile year on year performance stats and numbers of potential v actual responses for Course

Organisers



Course Organisers discuss outcomes at Course Review Meetings, agree proposed response to students as part of "you said... we did..." and provide summary report to L&TC on successes and problems



L&TC review year on year performance stats and Course Organiser summary report



L&TC approve programme report to students and pass to Student Experience Officer for publication

2.3. The Review Team recommend that the School continue its focus on the improvement of feedback given to students on their course work and examinations in light of the NSS results, and also on developing its assessment procedures.

AND

3.8.b. The Review Team recommend that Veterinary Medicine enforce compliance and consistency in the provision of feedback on all assessment performance. The Team particularly commend the practice in at least one course of holding a special examination feedback session, at which students were allowed to review their examination scripts as the course manager discussed with them how the questions might have been effectively tackled. The Review

Team recommend that this practice be extended to all courses.

The introduction of Formative Feedback Deadlines (as per University Regulations) provides all the students with the dates for in course assessment feedback. These dates are monitored by the Learning & Teaching Committee.

Discussions on feedback have seen a variety of improvements such as the Final Year feedback system on EEVeC.

Audio feedback has been positively received by the students as have immediate feedback session following MCQ style assessments. . Exam feedback sessions are included for all courses with written exams and as previously, students are encouraged to review their scripts individually and can arrange to do this with their tutor.

5.2.a. The Review Team recommend an improvement in opportunities given to students to complete module evaluation forms and that the School give students further opportunities to provide additional course specific feedback.

Following the TPR, the Learning & Teaching Committee focussed on all courses using the same core questions and agreeing the timing for the release of the surveys (at the end of teaching). The course surveys continued to be delivered via EEVeC. As the school moves away from EEVeC the course surveys are to be delivered through EVASYS.

The first course has used this service and in an effort to increase the response rates the school has provided the responses back to the students with commentary from the course organiser. The students have requested time to complete the surveys in paper format in class. The school will continue to explore the best ways of carrying out the module evaluation forms.

Staff Student Liaison Committees and the role of the Independent Course Advisor allow further opportunities for course specific feedback. Feedback can also be delivered through the “What matters to you?” system for anonymous comments.

There are further opportunities for feedback from the students via the Vet Student Council and meetings with the

Year Directors.

35



APPENDIX 5: BVM&S Exam Board Process

Course team mark scripts and return to VTO. Double marking by course team if essays involved

Marks collated

VTO Admin

Cronbach’s Alpha and item analysis reviewed

Performed by VTO, reviewed by pre-exam board

Questions removed if necessary

Pre-exam Board

All scripts between 45-55% scrutinised internally and a sample from across all grades.

Admin/Course Organiser/ Exam Chair depending on course

Borderline cases: Hofstee Standard Setting applied to total exam mark using the university definition of 2% above/below boundary and 0-15%^ fail rate*

(^fail rate can vary between course e.g. 10% for GEP courses *NB at this stage if results show unexpected pattern(s) the assessment executive should be consulted)

VTO Admin

External examiners* review pre-exam board process and all borderline fail scripts and minimum of 5 scripts in each of the credit/distinction categories. See External Examiner Checksheet.

(EE Guidance: http://www.ed.ac.uk/schools-departments/academic-services/qualityunit/quality-assurance/external-examining)

Full exam board ratifies processes and results

(BoE Guidance: http://www.ed.ac.uk/schools-departments/academicservices/staff/assessment/boards-examiners)

36

*Note that typically the exam board chair and/ or course organiser will meet the external examiner on arrival.

The normal expectation would be that the review process takes 2-3 hours with the exam board following shortly afterwards



BVM&S Exam Board Process Flowchart (Resits)

Papers set where possible using tried and tested questions such that a borderline student would be expected to gain 50%

Marks collated

All scripts scrutinised internally

Basic question statistics reviewed

External examiners review pre-exam board process and all scripts

Full exam board ratifies processes and results

(BoE Guidance: http://www.ed.ac.uk/schoolsdepartments/academicservices/staff/assessment/boards-examiners)

37



GUIDANCE NOTES:



"all scripts between 45-55 scrutinised internally"

Checking arithmetic, checking the sample for consistency between the answer given and the model answer, checking the marking against the feedback/grade descriptors and noting any discrepancies. Looking for trends.

Ensuring the personal tutor will be able to sit with tutee, script and model answer and understand the marking outcome after BoE releases results.

This is not double marking it's about consistency. Allows scrutiny of marking - students know that a marker knows their marks will be scrutinised.

Arithmetic errors can be corrected immediately. Further adjustment to marks can only be a recommendation that a range of marks should be scaled up or down by a nominated percentage (could be distinction range, could be fail range could be entire range).

Any changes can only be made in agreement with the course organiser.

Identify the sample on the spreadsheet and document the steps of the process.



“Cronbach’s Alpha and item analysis reviewed” and “questions removed if necessary”

Cronbach’s alpha (KR-20 for MCQs): ideally should be higher than 0.7. Exam boards should review the statistics and in particular any questions which result in the Cronbach’s becoming significantly higher if that question is removed (these items will typically also have a low item-total correlation)

For MCQs, the point bisserial (item total correlation) value for each question should be reviewed. A low or negative value may mean an incorrect answer has been keyed or there is some other problem with the question.

• Below 0.19 – review e.g. is this core content that everyone should know? (e.g. if all students get the question correct then it will be zero).

• 0.20 to 0.29 - marginal

• 0.30 and above - ideal

Any removed questions should be recorded on the course spreadsheet and any discussion/rationale for not removing poorly performing questions should also be recorded.



“Borderline cases: Hofstee Standard Setting applied to total exam mark using the university definition of

2% above/below boundary and 0-15% fail rate”

Borderline cases -in accordance with University regulations, the BoE give close scrutiny to borderline pass/fail cases, defined as lying within 2% of passing i.e. 48-52%. This allows year on year variation in assessment difficulty to be accounted for.

In the BVM&S during 2014/15 the process used to help reach a sound decision will be the Hofstee method of standard setting. Standard setting refers to the process used to define the pass mark for an exam.

To calculate the hofstee pass mark the exam board will consider the lowest and highest acceptable pass rate

(this is the university agreed borderline range of marks 48-52%) and the lowest and highest acceptable fail rate (0-15%). These % are then plotted against the range of marks for that given exam and a pass mark is

38


& Enhancement Report 2014/15 calculated. Students marks are then scaled accordingly. This means the pass mark for the exam is based upon a defensible, reproducible standard.

The Assessment Executive should be consulted if marks show unexpected pattern for the year/course/programme.

39



Appendix 6: School Personal Tutoring Statement

The Benefits of the Personal Tutor system

By working in partnership with your Personal Tutor you will:



Become a confident learner in your discipline and play an active part in your academic community.



Reflect on your academic progress and your effective use of academic feedback.



Develop the range of skills and attributes required for success at university and beyond.

More extensive details on all aspects of the Personal Tutoring system, as well as other sources of support within the RDSVS and the University, can be found via the ‘Student Information’ link on the homepage of EEVeC (Edinburgh Electronic Veterinary Curriculum) https://www.eevec.vet.ed.ac.uk/secure/myeevec.asp

Undergraduate Students

How your School will deliver these Benefits

During your early years at the University your School will schedule meetings to enable you to settle in and build a rapport with your Personal Tutor. Contact will gradually become less formal in the latter years of study however you are actively encouraged to schedule meetings with your Personal Tutor as required throughout your time at the University.

One-to-one Meetings

The number of one-to-one meetings with your PT in an academic session will vary depending on your year of study, with more frequent meetings in your first year of study. Each meeting will last no more than 20-30 minutes.

In Year 1 (5 year programme) and in Year 1 of Graduate Entry Programme (GEP) you will have three mandatory one-to-one meetings with your PT per academic session:

 Meeting 1: early in Semester 1

 Meeting 2: end of Semester 1

 Meeting 3: mid to late Semester 2

In Year 2 you will have two mandatory one-to-one meetings with your PT per academic session:

 Meeting 1: early in Semester 1

 Meeting 2: mid to late Semester 2

In Years 3, 4 and 5 you will have one mandatory one-to-one meeting with your PT per academic session (in March-April)

40



In addition to the above arrangements, and whatever the stage of your BVM&S studies, you should feel free to approach your PT for a meeting at any time during the academic year (see below - Adhoc

PT-Tutee Meetings)

The arrangements for PT meetings is also summarised in the table at the end of this document.

The Purpose of One-to-one Meetings

Meeting 1 (Year 1 & GEP) Theme - ‘Get to know each other’

An informal chat with your PT about your background and your thoughts on the year ahead. See it also as an opportunity to raise any initial queries or concerns with your PT.

Meeting 1 (Year 2) Theme- ‘Welcome back, let’s reflect and plan’

Reflection with your PT on the previous year of study and discussion of your goals and action points for the coming year.

Meeting 2 (Year 1 & GEP) Theme - ‘How are things going?’

Review of your progress and consideration of performance and feedback for any assessments. Agree actions with your PT for going forward.

March Meeting - all years (Meeting 3 for Year 1 & GEP, Meeting 2 for Year 2)

Theme – ‘Reflection on Progress & Portfolio discussion’

This meeting is for you and your PT to discuss your progress through the academic session and consider together the reflective elements of your personal portfolio. Once these elements have been discussed, your PT will sign the ‘Annual Self-appraisal Completion Record’ for inclusion in your portfolio; this is a requirement for the Professional and Clinical Skills course that runs years 1-4 of the

BVM&S degree programme. Arrangements for the portfolio element for final year will be communicated to you separately.

Attendance requirements

The one-to-one meetings outlined above are compulsory and your attendance will be logged. Should you either miss or have difficulty attending an arranged meeting you are expected to contact your PT with an explanation of your absence.

Arrangement and notification of meetings with your PT

This will normally be done via the ‘Book Meeting’ link on the EEVeC Profile Page of your PT: https://www.eevec.vet.ed.ac.uk/secure/myeevec.asp

Your PT will normally make a number of appointment slots available for you to sign up to, although some appointments may also be arranged by email and by use of EUCLID. Contact details of all academic and administrative staff are readily accessible on the EEVeC. Your PT will also use EEVeC or EUCLID to record notes of your meeting, these are confidential to you and your PT.

41



Adhoc PT-Tutee Meetings

You are encouraged to contact your PT at any time by email to arrange a meeting should you either require advice or be experiencing problems (academic or personal).

 Your PT will respond promptly (normally within three working days)

 Your PT will provide advice directly or refer you to the most appropriate support service

(in-school or central University).

If your PT is unavailable you should contact either one of the other PTs in your house or the Student

Experience Officer (SEO), Mr Mike Grieve (contact details below).

Should you fail a Professional Examination you will be advised to contact your PT.

Group Meetings

For new students (Year 1 and Year GEP) there will be a group meeting early in Semester 1 at which the Personal Tutor system and student support mechanisms will be explained. At the discretion of individual PTs, there may also be group meetings of tutees with their PT.

Peer Support

Peer Support activities are also available to every campus-based undergraduate. We’d encourage you to get involved with these as they’re a great way to engage with other students. Further information on the Dick Vet Peer Support Programme can be found via the ‘Student Information’ link on the homepage of EEVeC https://www.eevec.vet.ed.ac.uk/secure/myeevec.asp

Information about other Peer Support activities across the University can be found at the following link: EUSA

Peer Support

Study skills & VetPALs

The School offers study skill support sessions to all BVM&S students. The Study Skills Team (Catriona

Bell, Jessie Paterson, & Stacy Spielman) can help if you are either struggling to find a study method that works well or if you want to review an established study strategy. As well as general study skills help you can get advice on revision strategies, exam techniques and time management. To book an appointment, please e-mail Vet.StudySkills@ed.ac.uk

and someone will get back to you as soon as possible. We will find a time that suits your timetable.

All first year students on arrival will be allocated to a VetPAL group. Each VetPAL group will have two trained leaders from either third or fourth year and will meet at specific times during your first year for about an hour. Each session will be on a specific topic e.g. taking notes at lectures, time management, etc. The idea of these sessions is for you to start thinking around the topic and hear from others of successful and unsuccessful strategies that they have used. Further information is available from http://www.ed.ac.uk/schools-departments/vet/staff-students/undergrads/vetpals

For details of study skills provision available centrally, including details on spaces to study, see the IS

Study Skills website .

42



Student Support Organisational Structure – Who to Contact?

Your School aims to provide an environment where advice and guidance is available and where students take responsibility for their learning and personal development by engaging with their

Personal Tutor (PT), academic staff and peers.

As a BVM&S student you will be allocated to a PT and be a member of one of ten R(D)SVS Houses.

Details of your PT and House allocation are available via the ‘House Hub’ link on the homepage of

EEVeC https://www.eevec.vet.ed.ac.uk/secure/myeevec.asp

You can also find out who your PT is through MyEd https://www.myed.ed.ac.uk/

All schools have a Senior Tutor and a Student Support Team. Your Senior Tutor is Dr Geoff Pearson and he oversees the operation and monitoring of student support in RDSVS. Whilst the expectation is that you will have the same PT for the duration of your BVM&S studies, if circumstances dictate that you need to change your PT, please contact the Senior Tutor by email g.t.pearson@ed.ac.uk

The full RDSVS Student Support Team as follows:

Dr Geoff Pearson - Senior Tutor & Director of Student Affairs g.t.pearson@ed.ac.uk

0131 650 6137

Dr Rachel Whittington - Senior Lecturer in Professional Skills & Deputy Director of Student Affairs

Rachel.whittington@ed.ac.uk

Dr Catriona Bell – Senior Lecturer & Study Skills Coordinator

Catriona.Bell@ed.ac.uk

Prof Susan Rhind - Director of Teaching & Deputy Head of School

Susan.Rhind@ed.ac.uk

Dr Jessie Paterson – Lecturer in Student Learning

Jessie.Paterson@ed.ac.uk

Ms Stacy Spielman - Student Support Fellow (International) jspielma@staffmail.ed.ac.uk

Mr Mike Grieve - Student Experience Officer (SEO – Administration) Michael.Grieve@ed.ac.uk

0131 651 7380

43



Year Administrators (Student Support Officers)

Year 1 - Mrs Amanda Huggan Amanda.Huggan@ed.ac.uk

Year 2 - Mrs Heather Thomson hthomso3@staffmail.ed.ac.uk

Graduate Entry Programme (GEP) - Ms Sopita Sritawan Sopita.Sritawan@ed.ac.uk

Year 3 - Mrs Kerry Leech Kerry.Leech@ed.ac.uk

Year 4 - Mr Ben Morse Ben.Morse@ed.ac.uk

Year 5 - Mrs Sally Tait Sally.Tait@ed.ac.uk

Your first points of contact when you need advice/assistance

If you have a query relating to course issues (teaching materials, timetabling etc.) please address this to the appropriate year administrator.

For other academic and personal matters you should contact your Personal Tutor (PT). If your PT is unavailable you should contact either one of the other PTs in your house or the Student Experience

Officer (SEO) Mr Mike Grieve.

If you have urgent and or serious concerns and you have been unable to get help through the usual route please do not hesitate to contact any member of the Student Support Team, including the

Senior Tutor.

44



R(D)SVS Personal Tutor-Tutee meetings

2015-16

Updated guidance from the University requires Personal Tutors to meet with BVM&S students as detailed in the ‘Minimum individual

meetings’ column below. The table also includes a recommended best practice for PT-Tutees when scheduling meetings.

Key

1

GEP

2

3

4

5

Three

Three

Two

One

One

One

*I

I & G

G

I

R

R

R

I

I

R

R

R

R

I=Individual (mandatory)

* This meeting may be delayed to Sept/Oct if PT is on annual leave

G=Group meeting - delivered by Director &

Deputy Director of Student Affairs

N.B. A PT has the option of arranging a Group meeting with their tutees although attendance would not be mandatory for students.

45

R

I p

I p

I p

I p

I p

I p

R=Recommended (not mandatory)



I p = Individual meeting to discuss progress through year (mandatory)

46



47

PAPER 05: School Annual QA Report 14/15

linda.bruce@ed.ac.uk

Document control

R(D)SVS

BVM&S Quality Assurance

Process

Appendix 4: Summary Recommendations from TPR 2009/10

Course team mark scripts and return to VTO. Double marking by course team if essays involved

Marks collated

VTO Admin

Cronbach’s Alpha and item analysis reviewed

Performed by VTO, reviewed by pre-exam board

Questions removed if necessary

Pre-exam Board

All scripts between 45-55% scrutinised internally and a sample from across all grades.

Admin/Course Organiser/ Exam Chair depending on course

Borderline cases: Hofstee Standard Setting applied to total exam mark using the university definition of 2% above/below boundary and 0-15%^ fail rate*

VTO Admin

External examiners* review pre-exam board process and all borderline fail scripts and minimum of 5 scripts in each of the credit/distinction categories. See External Examiner Checksheet.

Full exam board ratifies processes and results

Papers set where possible using tried and tested questions such that a borderline student would be expected to gain 50%

Marks collated

All scripts scrutinised internally

Basic question statistics reviewed

External examiners review pre-exam board process and all scripts

Full exam board ratifies processes and results

Appendix 6: School Personal Tutoring Statement

Related documents

Products

Support

PAPER 05: School Annual QA Report 14/15

linda.bruce@ed.ac.uk

Document control

R(D)SVS

BVM&S Quality Assurance

Process

Appendix 4: Summary Recommendations from TPR 2009/10

Course team mark scripts and return to VTO. Double marking by course team if essays involved

Marks collated

VTO Admin

Cronbach’s Alpha and item analysis reviewed

Performed by VTO, reviewed by pre-exam board

Questions removed if necessary

Pre-exam Board

All scripts between 45-55% scrutinised internally and a sample from across all grades.

Admin/Course Organiser/ Exam Chair depending on course

Borderline cases: Hofstee Standard Setting applied to total exam mark using the university definition of 2% above/below boundary and 0-15%^ fail rate*

VTO Admin

External examiners* review pre-exam board process and all borderline fail scripts and minimum of 5 scripts in each of the credit/distinction categories. See External Examiner Checksheet.

Full exam board ratifies processes and results

Papers set where possible using tried and tested questions such that a borderline student would be expected to gain 50%

Marks collated

All scripts scrutinised internally

Basic question statistics reviewed

External examiners review pre-exam board process and all scripts

Full exam board ratifies processes and results

Appendix 6: School Personal Tutoring Statement

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