QAA praises Leeds’ teaching

The University of Leeds has received a full vote of confidence from the Quality Assurance Agency (QAA) in our management of academic standards and the quality of learning available to students.

The QAA conducted an institutional audit of the University in mid-March to ensure we offer our students a good quality of higher education – this process occurs once every five years.

An expression of ‘confidence’ by the QAA is the highest category of praise available (the other two categories are ‘limited confidence’ or ‘no confidence’).

Vice-Chancellor Professor Michael Arthur says he feels proud and delighted by the result: “This is a truly outstanding result – for the work we are doing together to be acknowledged in this way is great, but when you take into consideration the size and complexity of our University, it is a real tribute to get so many positive comments as well as the ‘confidence’ outcome.”

Some of the highlights of the Leeds student learning experience singled out for mention by the QAA auditors were:

• the development and consistent use of the strategy map as a tool for enhancement
• the varied mechanisms for making research-led teaching an increasingly distinctive feature of the University
• the importance given to teaching as well as research in the appointment and support of academic staff
• the development of mechanisms across the University for considering and publicising responses to the National Student Survey results.

Pro-Vice-Chancellor for learning and teaching Vivien Jones says the result is an important tribute to everyone involved in learning and teaching across the University, particularly the learning and teaching support and academic standards teams: “My thanks to everyone involved, and particularly to those colleagues who met with the auditors and clearly did an excellent job on behalf of all of us.”