Scotland's Tertiary Enhancement Programme website launched

QAA Scotland has launched the new website for Scotland's Tertiary Enhancement Programme (STEP), managed in partnership and jointly owned with the College Development Network (CDN).

This initiative is Scotland’s new national enhancement programme for colleges and universities. It is designed to enable colleges and universities to work together to improve and enhance learning, teaching, the student experience and staff development across tertiary education in Scotland.

"At the heart of the programme, we'll be supporting and promoting a series of collaborative enhancement projects designed to create insights and practical benefits of real value to the entire tertiary education sector," explains QAA Scotland's Heather Fotheringham. "From QAA's perspective, we're looking forward to bringing to this great new programme our own learning from the Enhancement Themes project which ran for two decades up until this summer, as we support and bring together colleagues and institutions to generate and promote new ways to enhance the learning experience of our students."

"This exciting new initiative is bringing together a wealth of talent and expertise from across Scotland's tertiary sector," adds Vicki Stott, Chief Executive of QAA. "It's brilliant to be working with the College Development Network and the Scottish Funding Council on this sector-led programme which is so focused on enhancing the experience and impacts offered by tertiary education in Scotland."

STEP is one of the delivery mechanisms of Scotland’s Tertiary Quality Enhancement Framework (TQEF). TQEF is designed to develop a more coherent and streamlined tertiary education system that supports institutions in delivering the best learning experience for students.

Running alongside STEP as part of the TQEF, QAA is also responsible for the delivery of Scotland's Tertiary Quality Enhancement Review (TQER) method, commissioned by the Scottish Funding Council. This replaces the separate review methods used in Scotland’s colleges and universities (Quality Enhancement and Standards Review for universities and How Good Is Our College for colleges) with a single approach to review the management of academic quality, standards and the student experience across all FE and HE education institutions in Scotland.

TQER is based upon a peer-led, enhancement-focused approach, and is now being implemented to review and support the assurance and enhancement of academic standards and the quality of the student learning experience across tertiary education in Scotland.