20 Years of Enhancement, Bulletin #2

The 20 Years of Enhancement campaign reflects on the past 20 years of Scotland’s enhancement-led approach to quality, providing current and past staff and students with the opportunity to explore lessons learned and the future of enhancement in a tertiary education sector. In the second of QAA Scotland’s regular updates on the campaign, we reflect on the activities completed so far and how you can get involved. 

Earlier this week, the second in our series of 20 Years of Enhancement blogs was published by WonkHE. In this blog post, Eve Lewis, Director of Student Partnerships in Quality Scotland (sparqs) reflects on the evolution of student engagement since the beginnings of Scotland’s enhancement-led approach to quality in 2003. She also explores the ways in which student voice is supported, encouraged and valued in Scotland’s higher education sector.

On Twitter (via @QAAScotland and @THEMEStweets) we continued to explore each of the Enhancement Themes since their introduction in 2003, including Evidence for Enhancement and Student Transitions, which are two of our most consistently popular Themes. Each of the 11 completed Enhancement Themes has a new overview outlining the continuing relevance of the Themes and the applicability of resources for students and staff at universities and colleges. We have recently finished our tour of the Themes, but you can keep up to date with the latest updates, including our Christmas ‘Festive Selection Box’, using #Enhancement20.

The first of the campaign’s virtual panels, Valuing student representation in quality enhancement, was held on 14 November 2022. We were absolutely delighted to be joined by 91 colleagues from the UK and beyond. The session brought together past student representatives to discuss the impact of student partnership in quality enhancement and the lessons that they learnt that inform their current roles. The voice of contemporary students was also strongly represented by our current Student Theme Lead, Heather Innes (Regional President, Highlands and Islands Students’ Association). We are very grateful to Eve Lewis for her expertise in hosting this session, and to our excellent and very knowledgeable panel, who talked passionately about how their experiences of the enhancement-led approach continues to support them in their current roles. We would also like to thank all our attendees whose input contributed to a very engaging discussion! A full recording of the panel is available on the 20 Years of Enhancement webpage.

In November, QAA Scotland closed the call for proposals for our 5th International Enhancement Conference, Shaping the Student Experience Together: 20 Years of Enhancement. The proposals are currently undergoing a peer review process and we intend to communicate all decisions in January 2023. The conference will be held on 14-15 June 2023 at Glasgow Caledonian University in Glasgow’s vibrant city centre. Would you like to be notified when we open registration? Make sure that you’ve submitted your details to us.

We are excited to share that we will be re-launching an update of QAA Scotland’s Transition Skills and Strategies resources as part of the 20 Years of Enhancement campaign in January 2023. These resources have been updated to support their use by students, and the staff who support them, in a tertiary education environment. We are making the final adjustments and plan to publish on 9 January 2023.

Interested in learning more about the 20 Years of Enhancement campaign? Then check out the Enhancement Themes website. We’ll be updating the 20 Years of Enhancement campaign webpage regularly, so look out for session recordings and other exciting opportunities to get involved. Join the conversation online using #Enhancement20.