Institutional Quality Audit (IQA)

Institutional Quality Audit (IQA) refers to Stage 1 of the two-stage Institutional Accreditation Process. Each Higher Education Institution (HEI) only undergoes IQA once, usually after the graduation of a first full cohort of students. 

 

IQA is conducted by a Panel of locally-based and international External Reviewers, selected from the Register of External Reviewers (RER ) and guided in the process by a Review Director. It commences with the submission by the HEI of a Self-Study Portfolio and Supporting Materials (SMs), reviewed by the Panel, and includes a Panel Visit during which interviews are conducted with different stakeholders, such as the HEI’s governance, management, staff and students.  

 

IQA is a developmental process aimed at helping HEIs build and improve their internal quality assurance systems to be better prepared for the second stage of the Institutional Accreditation process, namely Institutional Standards Assessment (ISA). For this reason, IQA does not result in a Pass or Fail outcome; it results in a report containing three types of formal Panel conclusions, known for short as ‘CARs’. 

 

CARs refer to Commendations where the Panel recognises instances of particularly good practice; Affirmations where the Panel identifies instances in which the HEI has accurately identified a significant opportunity for improvement and has demonstrated appropriate commitment to addressing the matter, and Recommendations to draw the HEI’s attention to a significant opportunity for improvement that it has either not yet accurately identified or to which it is not yet adequately attending. 

 

All activities included in the IQA process are conducted in accordance with the rules and regulations contained in the IQA Manual.