No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. Details on how to seek permission, further information about the Publisher’s permissions policies and our arrangements with organizations such as the Copyright Clearance Center and the Copyright Licensing Agency, can be found at our website: www.elsevier.com/permissions.
This book and the individual contributions contained in it are protected under copyright by the Publisher (other than as may be noted herein).
Notices
Knowledge and best practice in this field are constantly changing. As new research and experience broaden our understanding, changes in research methods, professional practices, or medical treatment may become necessary.
Practitioners and researchers must always rely on their own experience and knowledge in evaluating and using any information, methods, compounds, or experiments described herein. In using such information or methods they should be mindful of their own safety and the safety of others, including parties for whom they have a professional responsibility.
To the fullest extent of the law, neither the Publisher nor the authors, contributors, or editors, assume any liability for any injury and/or damage to persons or property as a matter of products liability, negligence or otherwise, or from any use or operation of any methods, products, instructions, or ideas contained in the material herein.
ISBN: 978-0-12-802105-7
British Library
Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
A catalog record for this book is available from the Library of Congress
Library of Congress Control Number: 2015955064
For information on all Chandos Publishing visit our website at http://store.elsevier.com/
DEDICATION
To all those I have worked with for over 40 years to provide high quality services for library users.
LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS
Leo Appleton
Library Services, University of the Arts London, London, United Kingdom; Library and Student Support, Liverpool John Moores University, Liverpool, United Kingdom
Jeremy Atkinson
Jeremy Atkinson Consultancy, Cardiff, Wales, United Kingdom
Kathryn Ball
Assessment and Accountability, McMaster University Library, Hamilton, ON, Canada
Jackie Belanger
Assessment and Planning, University of Washington Libraries, Seattle, WA, USA
Candice Benjes-Small
Information Literacy & Outreach, McConnell Library, Radford University, Radford,VA, USA
Aldwyn Cooper
Vice Chancellor and Chief Executive Officer, Regent’s University London, London, United Kingdom
Matt Cunningham
University Library, Loughborough University, Loughborough, United Kingdom
Helen Fallon
University Library, Maynooth University, Maynooth, Republic of Ireland
Meg Gorman
University Library Service and Postgraduate School of Medical and Dental Education (Wales Deanery), Cardiff University, Wales, United Kingdom
Steve Hiller
Assessment and Planning, University of Washington Libraries, Seattle, WA, USA
Ann Holmes
Formerly Deputy Vice Chancellor, University of Wolverhampton, Wolverhampton, United Kingdom
Margie Jantti
Library Services, University of Wollongong, Wollongong, NSW, Australia
Glynnis Johnson
Client Liaison Services, University of Cape Town Libraries, Cape Town, South Africa
Michael Jubb
Research Information Network, London, United Kingdom
Kate Kelly
Library Services, Southern Cross University, NSW, Australia
Liz Kerr
Learning Resources, Regent’s University London, London, United Kingdom
Elizabeth Kocevar-Weidinger
Library, Howard Community College, Columbia, MD, USA
Martin Lewis
Formerly University Library, University of Sheffield, Sheffield, United Kingdom
Vivian Lewis
Office of the University Librarian, McMaster University, Hamilton, ON, Canada
Alison Little University Library, University of Sheffield, Sheffield, United Kingdom
Gemma Long
Quality Assurance Agency, United Kingdom
Alison Mackenzie
Edge Hill University, Lancashire, United Kingdom; SCONUL Performance Measurement and Quality Strategy Group, London, United Kingdom
Frances O’Neil
Scholarly Information Services, Library, Victoria University, VIC, Australia
Fiona Parsons
Directorate of Academic Support, University of Wolverhampton, Wolverhampton, United Kingdom
Janet Peters
University Library Service, Cardiff University, Wales, United Kingdom
Jon Purcell
University Library, Durham University, Durham, United Kingdom
Jaya Raju
Library and Information Studies Centre, University of Cape Town, Cape Town, South Africa
Reggie Raju
Client Liaison Services, University of Cape Town Libraries, Cape Town, South Africa
Danny Saunders
Quality Assurance Agency, United Kingdom
Eryl Smith
North Wales NHS Library Service, Glan Clwyd Hospital, Betsi Cadwaladr Health Board, Wales, United Kingdom
Simon Speight
University Library and Heritage Collections, Durham University, Durham, United Kingdom
Stephen Town
Formerly University Library, University of York,York, United Kingdom
Jakob Trischler
Southern Cross Business School, Southern Cross University, NSW, Australia
Graham Walton
University Library, Loughborough University, Loughborough, United Kingdom
ABOUT THE EDITOR
Jeremy Atkinson has wide-ranging experience and expertise in the leadership, management and development of academic library services. He had overall responsibility for the strategic and operational management of library and information services at the University of Glamorgan from 1991 to 2012. He previously held library posts at the University of Northumbria, Cardiff University and Manchester Metropolitan University.
Jeremy was a key member of University-wide and Faculty quality assurance groups at the University of Glamorgan, played an important role in a number of institutional quality reviews and led the development of library service agreements with Glamorgan’s further education partner colleges.
For 8 years, Jeremy was Chair of the SCONUL/UCISA Working Group on Quality Assurance which involved close liaison with the Quality Assurance Agency and he was responsible for leading the production of an ‘Aide-Memoire for QAA Reviewers Evaluating Learning Resources’. As Chair of the Working Group, he was invited to give the keynote paper on the UK experience of quality assurance of learning resources at the FOTIM/CHELSA Conference in Pretoria in South Africa in 2006.
Jeremy has had a long-standing and active involvement in a large number of UK strategic committees and groups, notably those of Jisc (continuous involvement from 1998 to 2012), SCONUL (including 3 years as a trustee and member of SCONUL Executive Board) and WHELF (Wales Higher Education Libraries Forum). Jeremy has produced a wide range of publications and conference papers on topics including change management, quality assurance, electronic resources, library collaboration and networked moving images. His most recent experience (2012 to date) is as a Library and Information Services Consultant working with a number of high profile clients, including Jisc, SCONUL and individual UK universities. This work has included research and reviews of library and information services and projects.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I would like to thank everyone who has made this book possible: to the authors of the chapters and case studies for agreeing to be involved and for producing their contributions to time; to Glyn Jones, Harriet Clayton and George Knott of Chandos Publishing for their support at all stages of the project; and to my wife Chris, my daughter Verity and friends and colleagues for their support, patience and suggestions during the research and editing process.
CHAPTER 1 Introduction
Jeremy Atkinson
Jeremy Atkinson Consultancy, Cardiff, Wales, United Kingdom
In recent years, there has been a greater emphasis on the quality, relevance and effectiveness of academic library services. This has partly come about because of the financial constraints under which universities have had to operate, but also because of the implications of the strategic planning and business processes put in place by universities, the requirements of quality assurance bodies and the move to view students as ‘customers’ with service expectations and a strong consumer voice.
Quality is always a rather elusive concept. Definitions from the Oxford English Dictionary highlight the problem: ‘The standard of something as measured against other things of a similar kind’; ‘The degree of excellence of something’; ‘A distinctive attribute or characteristic possessed by someone or something’. The first two definitions are probably more relevant to the consideration of quality in academic libraries, but we probably all want our libraries to be distinctive and different as well as being excellent and having high standards of service.
Beginning to think about quality and academic libraries when preparing for this book, I started to appreciate the number of different aspects and perspectives. Interestingly, I also recognised the many different roles that I had played in my career in helping to deliver and develop quality library services and in assessing and reviewing their effectiveness. As a subject librarian and library manager, I had liaised and surveyed to find out what our students, staff and researchers really wanted and tried hard to deliver relevant and useful services. I used and developed various tools and techniques to measure the effectiveness of our services. I played my part in validations and subject reviews on both sides of the fence, helping to ensure that courses and the library services to support them were up to scratch. I produced documentation and did my best to be a well prepared interviewee when the QAA (Quality Assurance Agency) came to
call to assess our institutional quality. As Chair of the SCONUL/UCISA Working Group on Quality Assurance1 I tried to influence the QAA to look at library services in a more considered way during institutional reviews. I was on the receiving end when consultants reviewed our library services, and then, several years later, saw the process from a different perspective when I was a consultant reviewing another institution’s library service.
This led me to want to try to capture all these different perspectives, to hear the different voices and the views of the different players in order to produce a rounded picture of quality and the academic library. So, in this book, there are views, perspectives and case studies not just from librarians, but also from university senior managers, an auditor, a QAA manager and those involved in large scale reviews of library services.
The literature relating to the quality of the academic library has become substantial and complex and can be difficult for the nonexpert librarian or librarianship student to gain access to and understand. The aim of this book is to help deal with this problem by providing a wide ranging introduction and overview of the area whilst, at the same time, offering a practical approach through case studies and up to date and reflective content for the more experienced information professional. The book also seeks to present a different approach by:
● Providing accessible content within the overviews of each area, and including the more readable articles in the references and further reading sections.
● Providing signposts to the key trends, key developments and key resources.
● Covering the different aspects. Introductions are provided to the different quality concepts and approaches. The different ways quality is looked at in academic libraries – assurance, assessment, review and enhancement – are examined and there is detailed coverage of the changing nature of library services and support and the approaches used to analyse quality in two of the key market segments for libraries in students and researchers.
● Looking at the changing environment in which academic libraries are operating. Consideration of quality cannot be static because of the enormous changes within and around the library services, and libraries themselves have to change to continue to provide high quality and relevant services. Where appropriate, there is coverage of the political, economic, social and technological changes impacting on academic
libraries, the changing nature and requirements of students and other users, the changes in scholarly communication, teaching and learning and the transformation in the roles of libraries and librarians.
● Taking a UK focus but including international perspectives. Although the editor and a number of the contributors are from the United Kingdom, the book also seeks to include an international dimension with contributions from the United States, Canada, Australia, South Africa and Ireland and the coverage of the literature is international in scope.
I also thought it would be helpful if I asked contributors, particularly of the case studies, to adopt an approach of critical reflection, where appropriate. Much of the literature relating to quality and academic libraries very usefully describes and analyses developments in the field. Although this approach is also taken here, I felt it was timely to ask contributors to reflect on quality approaches, developments and projects and their implications, impact and significance. I hope this will help readers to gain a deeper understanding of quality as it affects the academic library and the benefits and constraints of different approaches and methods and to reflect on issues and events in their own library service.
The ideas of reflective practice and critical reflection have been used increasingly in recent years in a number of professional fields, including health and care sciences. The development and understanding of specialised knowledge are essential for professional practice, and using approaches of self-consciousness (reflection) and continual self-critique (critical reflection) have been found to be useful to the development of continuing competence (Williams, 2001). In contrast, reflection has had less attention in the management and leadership literature with managers often placing more emphasis on action and outcomes (Gray, 2007). The pace of change in organisations and the day-to-day demands of the workplace often leave little time for reflection.
The aims of critical reflection are for practitioners to: understand the nature and meaning of practice; correct and improve the practice through self-reflection and criticism; generate models of good practice and theories of application through reflection and critique of actual occurrences. Critical reflection has three phases: a descriptive phase, with descriptions of practice or events; a reflective phase, with reflective analysis of events or situations; and a critical phase, with a critique of practice (Kim, 1999).
I used this approach and, in particular, Borton’s Developmental Model (1970) of ‘What? So What? Now What?’ to develop a simple critical
reflection framework for the contributors to this book to help them in the writing of the chapters and case studies. This framework is given below. Additional references on critical reflection are given in the Further Reading section at the end of the book.
Critical reflection element Questions
What? Description
So What? Analysis
● What was the problem that was being looked at?
● What was the context for the work?
● How was the work carried out?
● What methods were used?
● Who carried the work out?
● Who were the interviewees/respondents?
● What was my own role in the work?
● What did I do?
● Was the work effective?
● What worked well?
● What worked less well?
● What was learned about the library, the customers and the organisation as a result of the work?
● Did the methods used produce the information required to help solve the problem?
● Were the methods adapted during the work as a result of experience gained?
● How was the information obtained analysed?
● What were the main recommendations and conclusions arising from the work?
Now What? Synthesis
● What changes were made as a result of carrying out the work?
● Of the changes made, what has worked well and what has worked less well?
● What has been the impact and significance of the changes made?
● What still needs to be done to resolve issues/improve the service?
● On reflection, did the methods selected work as originally intended?
● Did they help to solve the original problem?
● Did they help to provide an effective assessment of service provision?
● How would I do the work differently if I was to do it again?
● What different methods/approaches would I use?
ENDNOTE
1. The Working Group on Quality Assurance was a joint group of SCONUL (Society of College, National and University Libraries) and UCISA (Universities and Colleges Information Systems Association).
REFERENCES
Borton, T. (1970). Reach, touch and teach: Student concerns and process education. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill.
Gray, D. E. (2007). Facilitating management learning: Developing critical reflection through reflective tools. Management Learning, 38(5), 495–517. Retrieved from <http://epubs. surrey.ac.uk/7876/1/fulltext.pdf>.
Kim, H. S. (1999). Critical reflective inquiry for knowledge development in nursing practice. Journal of Advanced Nursing, 29(5), 1205–1212.
Williams, B. (2001). Developing critical reflection for professional practice through problembased learning. Journal of Advanced Nursing, 34(1), 27–34. Retrieved from <http://www. themedfomscu.org/media/elip/PBL45.pdf>.
CHAPTER 2
Quality, Universities and Their Libraries: An Overview
Jeremy Atkinson
Jeremy Atkinson Consultancy, Cardiff, Wales, United Kingdom
During the last 20 years, with an increasing government focus on market approaches and university performance and accountability, universities in the United Kingdom have become more managerial in their approach with a greater emphasis on performance, efficiency and meeting customer needs. From the perspective of some academic staff, this has led to some tensions with the long standing philosophies of academic freedom and autonomy (Docherty, 2014). From the perspective of senior university managers, universities have needed to become more like businesses, with a requirement to apply business practices and techniques, including strategic planning, key performance indicators, quality management and service quality. Similar trends can also be seen in other countries (Anderson, 2008; Arimoto, 2010).
The competitive, performance related, business focused and market led nature of current UK higher education can be clearly seen in a number of trends and developments taking place within institutions:
● The almost continuous and complex academic quality assurance processes that have been applied, both internally (e.g. course approval, validation, annual monitoring, periodic review, external examiner systems) and externally (e.g. quality reviews, professional body accreditations). Failure in external assessments can be extremely significant for the status of the institution and its ability to run courses.
● The time and effort that goes into preparation for periodic research assessment exercises, such as the REF (Research Excellence Framework) in the United Kingdom. An inadequate performance can result in loss of institutional funding and reputation and potential closure of poor performing departments (Ratcliffe, 2014).
● The obsession with league tables and benchmarking (national and international), with the institution continually seeking to maintain,
or preferably improve, position in order to enhance status and recruitment.
● The time and effort put into running and responding to surveys, both internally and nationally (e.g. National Student Survey in the United Kingdom) to seek to identify customer satisfaction, respond to customer needs and to maintain institutional status.
● The achievement of a Standard (e.g. Investors in People, Customer Service Excellence) which can develop university staff and service quality, but which can also have competitive advantages.
● The requirement to provide a range of institutional performance data for the Key Information Set1 to help students make their choice where to study.
● The implementation of rigorous and time consuming strategic planning processes, seeking to gain competitive advantage and trying to ensure integration within the institution (‘everyone singing from the same hymn sheet’).
● A focus on value for money and the potential of shared services, such as purchasing consortia, to achieve efficiencies (Universities UK, 2015). These developments have implications for structures and processes and have required universities to put in place rigorous systems to ensure that quality processes are applied consistently and comprehensively and that outcomes and feedback are acted upon to deliver continuous improvement. In the United Kingdom most universities have an organisational structure including a central academic or quality office to ensure that academic quality processes are implemented effectively, a central research office to coordinate research processes and research assessment activity, and, increasingly, a planning unit to lead on activities such as strategic planning, data returns and process improvement. The increasing importance of continuous process improvement can be seen in a job advertisement at the University of Gloucestershire in December 2014 for a Process Improvement Manager in the Planning Office with responsibility for ‘developing and supporting improvement projects and programmes across the University and developing a culture of continuous improvement … as part of the University’s commitment to improving administrative performance’.
As well as organisational structures, there are also implications for the quality methods used. Quality management techniques and tools that were originally used in large manufacturing organisations in the 1980s and 1990s have been looked at by universities keen to eliminate waste,
create more value for customers and carry out continuous improvement. Approaches such as Total Quality Management were particularly popular at one point, but now tend to be overshadowed by ISO 9001, Lean Management and Six Sigma. Lean thinking has been applied in institutions such as Cardiff University2 and University of St Andrews3 in the United Kingdom (Hines & Lethbridge, 2008) and in a number of universities in the United States (Comm & Mathaisel, 2005). Other techniques such as Six Sigma have been applied to academic processes as well as corporate university processes (Pryor, Alexander, Taneja, Tirumalasetty, & Chadalavada, 2012), but there is also a recognition that there can be challenges in applying these corporate quality approaches in what can often be significantly different environments (Jenicke, Kumar, & Holmes, 2008). When applying service quality techniques in universities, there can also be difficulties in defining customers and measuring customer satisfaction (Quinn, Lemay, Larsen, & Johnson, 2009).
What does this changing environment, with its greater emphasis on customers, performance and efficiencies, mean for academic libraries? When I was a senior library manager talking to new members of staff I always tried to emphasise a simple message – that we wouldn’t have jobs if it wasn’t for our users and that our aim should be to try to deliver the best possible service for them. Updated to the new environment, academic librarians will need to adopt (and embrace) new approaches and methodologies to assess and improve the quality and performance of their services and be able to demonstrate to their customers and managers the relevance and value of their services.
Although not without its challenges in terms of making appropriate links and gaining acceptance, librarians need to try to ensure that they are plugged in to the university corporately, for example through the development of plans closely aligned to university strategies (McNichol, 2005). They will also need to secure appropriate involvement in academic processes, such as course approval and validation, subject review (Costella, Adam, Gray, Nolan, & Wilkins, 2013), accreditation (Stratford, 2002) and quality audit (Balague, Duren, Juntunen, & Saarti, 2014).
In this demanding quality and performance environment, there are two key challenges for library managers:
● They need to create a culture of assessment amongst their own staff and their users (Lakos & Phipps, 2004)
● They need to ensure that they and their staff are embedded with the rest of the university at all levels (Dewey, 2004).
CASE STUDIES
Many of these themes are explored further by other contributors to this book. In the case studies that follow in this section, the quality assurance of universities’ academic provision is considered in detail. Ann Holmes and Fiona Parsons examine the implications and impact of quality assurance requirements for universities on academic library services; Gemma Long and Danny Saunders look at quality reviews of higher education provision in the United Kingdom and the role of the Quality Assurance Agency; and Helen Fallon and Jon Purcell reflect on a quality review from the perspectives of both reviewer and reviewee.
ENDNOTES
1. Key Information Set: https://unistats.direct.gov.uk/find-out-more/key-information-set.
2. Lean at Cardiff University: http://www.cardiff.ac.uk/lean/about/cardiff/index.html.
3. University of St Andrews. Lean University: Doing Things Differently: https://www.standrews.ac.uk/lean/.
REFERENCES
Anderson, G. (2008). Mapping academic resistance in the managerial university. Organization, 15(2), 251–270.
Arimoto, A. (2010). The academic profession and the managerial university: An international comparative study from Japan. European Review, 18(Suppl. S1), S117–S139. Retrieved from <http://journals.cambridge.org/action/displayAbstract?fromPage=online&aid=7 451384&fulltextType=RA&fileId=S1062798709990354>.
Balague, N., Duren, P., Juntunen, A., & Saarti, J. (2014). Quality audits as a tool for quality improvement in selected European higher education institutions. Journal of Academic Librarianship, 40(5), 529–533.
Comm, C., & Mathaisel, D. (2005). A case study in applying lean sustainability concepts to universities. International Journal of Sustainability in Higher Education, 6(2), 134–146.
Costella, J., Adam, T., Gray, F., Nolan, N., & Wilkins, C. (2013). Undergraduate program review processes: A case study in opportunity for academic libraries. Journal of Academic Librarianship, 39(2), 169–174.
Dewey, B. I. (2004). The embedded librarian: Strategic campus collaborations. Resource Sharing & Information Networks, 17(1–2), 5–17.
Docherty, T. (December 4, 2014). Thomas Docherty on academic freedom. Times Higher Education Retrieved from <https://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/features/thomasdocherty-on-academic-freedom/2017268.article>.
Hines, P., & Lethbridge, S. (2008). New development: Creating a lean university. Public Money and Management, 28(1), 53–56.
Jenicke, L. O., Kumar, A., & Holmes, M. C. (2008). A framework for applying six sigma improvement methodology in an academic environment. The TQM Journal, 20(5), 453–462.
Lakos, A., & Phipps, S. (2004). Creating a culture of assessment: A catalyst for organizational change. Portal: Libraries and the Academy, 4(3), 345–361.
McNichol, S. (2005). The challenges of strategic planning in academic libraries. New Library World, 106(11–12), 496–509.
Pryor, M. G., Alexander, C., Taneja, S., Tirumalasetty, S., & Chadalavada, D. (2012). The application of six sigma methodologies to university processes: The use of student teams. Journal of Case Studies in Accreditation and Assessment, 2, 123–136. Retrieved from <http://www.aabri.com/manuscripts/111045.pdf>.
Quinn, A., Lemay, G., Larsen, P., & Johnson, D. M. (2009). Service quality in higher education. Total Quality Management & Business Excellence, 20(2), 139–152.
Ratcliffe, R. (December 17, 2014). REF 2014: Why is it such a big deal? Guardian Retrieved from <http://www.theguardian.com/higher-education-network/2014/ dec/17/ref-2014-why-is-it-such-a-big-deal>.
Stratford, S. K. (2002). Surviving a distance learning accreditation visit. Journal of Library Administration, 37(3–4), 489–501.
Universities UK, (2015). Efficiencies, effectiveness and value for money. London: Universities UK. Retrieved from <http://www.universitiesuk.ac.uk/highereducation/Documents/ 2015/EfficiencyEffectivenessValueForMoney.pdf>.
CHAPTER
3
The Institutional HE Quality Perspective
Ann Holmes1 and Fiona Parsons2
1Formerly Deputy Vice Chancellor, University of Wolverhampton, Wolverhampton, United Kingdom
2Directorate of Academic Support, University of Wolverhampton, Wolverhampton, United Kingdom
INTERNAL MEASURES
There are a number of key drivers both internal and external for assuring and enhancing the quality of an institution’s academic library, or Library and Information Service (LIS). In addition, the institution’s own strategic plan should reflect the position of LIS as an enabler in delivering the University strategy and its sub-strategies, such as Learning & Teaching, Research and the Student Experience. The reflection of the role of an academic library in the institution’s strategic vision should then be mirrored in the department’s own plan and annual operating statement, along with the allocation of appropriate resources to ensure that the plan can be delivered. If we reflect on an institution’s own quality assurance processes that are intended to underpin and lead to the enhancement of learning opportunities, and within that general term the academic library service, we find that relying on internal quality assurance frameworks to deliver improvements may be more hit and miss. It is an expectation of the Quality Code that Higher Education providers have formal processes for programme approval (QAA, 2013a). This is now embedded into most institutions’ quality assurance policies and procedures. Programme approval is normally a two-stage process: the first stage usually takes the form of outline planning permission which may not directly involve the academic library; at the second stage, i.e. the formal validation and approval of the programme, the library service should be involved as the service is key in ensuring the delivery of an ‘excellent’ student experience through the provision of learning opportunities. The validation process may involve a member of the academic library service, possibly a subject librarian, as a panel member on the presenting team or, as is becoming increasingly more common, a virtual validation with library staff providing comments on whether the proposal can be supported and the impact on resources.
It is arguable whether on occasions the full resource implications of this ‘signing off’ by an academic library service is fully appreciated by the institution. Institutional academic planning is not always aligned with institutional fiscal planning. Faculty and academic departments are not necessarily aware of the requirements, not only for additional scholarly resources, but also of the broader impact on library services. It is noticeable that there is no single sectoral view of ‘best practice’ in developing budgetary models for academic library resources. In the context of convergence of IT and Library services, the ‘disconnect’ between academic planning, and impact on the service, can be even more marked in the case of IT Services. Questions such as software purchase and deployment, access for students to appropriate devices, and support services, can be completely absent from planning and validation processes. The Observatory on Borderless Higher Education report into TNE (Lawton & Jensen, 2015) noted that IT Services are almost invisible in planning for TNE (Transnational Education) and overseas curriculum development. This, in spite of the fact that digitised information resources are critical to successful delivery of any academic programme, whether UK or overseas. In any event, even though programme proposals may be part of a broader institutional wide programme planning process, it is still a fairly reactive approach to quality assuring and enhancing academic library services. This is also the case where academic libraries are involved in the periodic review of programmes or subject areas. Institutions schedule periodic review on a rolling programme whereby subject areas or programmes are reviewed every 5–6 years. Again the Quality Code places an expectation on higher education providers that programmes will be subject to review (QAA, 2013b). For the most part periodic review processes have a tendency to be retrospective, based on an evidence base of annual monitoring, external examiners reports, and a range of student surveys. As part of the process it is customary for the subject area under review to produce a self-evaluation document that is reflective and evaluative – a challenge in itself. Whilst periodic review should provide an opportunity for change, in many cases this may be quite limited and unless issues have been identified for the library service in the evidence, it is not necessarily an effective way of quality assuring or enhancing the LIS provision. It is also likely that where issues have been raised in surveys, etc., that these will have already been addressed by the service.
Disintermediation of information and consequential concerns about the visibility of academic libraries is widespread. The academic library
community has been dealing with the issue of how best to demonstrate its value for years, especially value to students. Whilst a good deal of evidence is collected, much of this is evidence of activity rather than evidence of value and impact, especially value to and impact on teaching and research staff and learning opportunities.
In the United Kingdom, driven by the QAA Quality Code, all institutions delivering higher education programmes will have some form of annual monitoring of programmes (QAA, 2013b). This has traditionally been a retrospective activity conducted at the end of an academic year reflecting on the performance of a programme or course or suite of programmes and informed by module evaluations, surveys, external examiner reports and a range of data on enrolments, retention, progression and completion. The scope within this process for capturing anything other than local student views on library services tends to be limited, as the focus (one might say quite rightly) has been on the programme or course.
Whilst annual monitoring will usually result in some form of action plan, the approach reinforces a more retrospective and reactive approach to quality assurance and enhancement. Some institutions have moved or are moving to continuous improvement monitoring which provides for a more proactive approach to monitoring with a real focus on enhancement. If timed appropriately all students may benefit from this process. The information on the programme is a ‘living’ document rather than a snapshot and there may be opportunities for the model to be adapted for use by services. However there are limitations in that continuous improvement monitoring is very dependent on staff being actively engaged in what can be an onerous process.
Libraries continuously seek appropriate, and systematic, ways to capture evidence of their value. Creaser and Spezi (2012) point out that ‘libraries genuinely want to do well and serve their community of users’. Their report focuses on value to teaching and research staff, and they conclude that libraries can show their value to teaching and research staff most effectively by describing this in terms of benefits, for example, staff time saved (e.g. in identifying and obtaining access to information resources), increased quality of student assignments, and increased contact hours. Indirectly, such value to teaching and research staff will translate into value for the student.
One key internal driver for assuring and enhancing the quality of the library service is the student experience, although this raises the question whether students know or recognise what a ‘quality’ library service
should look like. Whilst institutions may perceive students as partners, students in the current financial fee climate may see themselves as customers at least for some aspects of an institution’s provision, including LIS. The experience of students is positively impacted by their engagement with library services, not solely through timely access to appropriate information resources, but also by the types of academic skills programmes offered, and independent study facilities which academic libraries provide. Student academic success, and student employability is improved through development of information and digital literacies – key graduate attributes. There is a range of mechanisms which libraries adopt in seeking input from students and other stakeholders to enhance service development. Ideally, internally one would expect to see a continuous improvement monitoring approach leading to proactive enhancement. Positioning libraries appropriately within an institutional continuous improvement approach is challenging. In converged services – whether Library and IT, or Libraries with other student services – an additional challenge exists of establishing a consistent approach to measuring satisfaction and quality across the whole service. Adopting an approach such as the student lifecycle approach taken at Liverpool John Moores University, may provide a way forward. Appleton (2012) describes the development and adoption of a quality assurance framework which accommodates differing service providers within a converged service directorate. Through focus on the student experience, rather than the service provider, evidence can be collected of impact at different points in the journey. Student learning opportunities can therefore be evaluated in a holistic way, using a consistent and ‘fit for purpose’ framework.
SURVEYS
Surveys can be used not only to provide a snapshot of student opinion but also the opportunity to undertake a longitudinal study of the service. However, we wonder, in reality, how effective are surveys in improving the service? There are various survey mechanisms for reviewing and assessing the provision used across the sector: course and module evaluations which feed into annual monitoring – these tend to focus on the subject and the resources to support the module and programme including books, journals and computers. This type of evaluation tends to focus on ‘hygiene’ factors, and rarely looks at the broader service value.
There may be internal institutional wide surveys which capture the student experience and complement national surveys. However, as students generally associate themselves with a course or programme, responses tend to provide a narrow view of their experience.
There are of course a range of external surveys, not least the National Student Survey,1 and the Postgraduate Taught Experience Survey & Postgraduate Research Experience Survey2 which attempt to drive up the quality of the student experience. These surveys include questions about resources including the library service and at the very least provide an opportunity for benchmarking by institutions, but tend to lack the detail for identifying and sharing good practice between service providers. How institutions use the outcome of such surveys varies by institution. Many may subsume the outcomes into the annual monitoring process where the view of the library services may be diluted by scores for teaching & learning, feedback etc. Others may expect separate responses and action plans to be monitored through the various committee structures. However, in each case these surveys whilst providing a snapshot for quality assurance of the library provision do not necessarily provide a strategic approach to quality assurance and enhancement.
The Society of College, National and University Libraries (SCONUL)3 runs its own annual statistical survey which has the benefit of a strong longitudinal data set. In itself, it is not an evaluative tool, although the data set has been mined for a variety of purposes, including institutional benchmarking, and trend analysis. The contribution of the SCONUL survey to evaluation of academic libraries has been indirect, therefore, but it remains a significant feature in the performance measurement landscape.
OTHER MECHANISMS
Most academic libraries, recognising the limitations of surveys for providing intelligence on the quality of library services, seek to implement other approaches to obtaining views on service quality. The discussion of good practice through journal articles, conference presentations and professional networks, indicates adoption of a sometimes bewildering variety of tools. These range from the well-established, such as benchmarking and performance measures (KPIs, balanced scorecard) to the fashionably new, such as the increasing use of analytics.
The use of analytics in higher education attracts some controversy. In reflecting on the utilisation of analytics in the library, we note that there is still limited research on its value. We have already noted that evaluation of impact on the student experience is most effective when academic libraries’ contribution is considered as part of a holistic, joined up, and strategic approach. Learning analytics uses data about students and their activities to help institutions understand and improve educational processes, and provide better support to learners. Contribution of library activity data to analytics programmes will help libraries to position themselves in a key role in their institutional understanding of the learner journey.
Many institutions have user groups on which students sit to inform the development of the service. In addition more formally there may be service level agreements pertaining to the library and other services. For example the American Library Association has published Standards for Libraries in Higher Education4 based on size, usability, diversity, accessibility and technologies. Professional, Statutory and Regulatory Bodies (PSRBs) may also impose requirements on libraries as part of the accreditation process. These requirements will normally be identified during validation or periodic review. Some PSRBs are more proactive than others in visiting institutions to check such things as holdings, others will accept a database. For example, the NHS provides a toolkit to enable a quality assessment of library services which extends to human and material resources.5
QUALITY ASSURANCE AGENCY
The Quality Assurance Agency is the body with responsibility for assuring quality and enhancement in UK higher education. Higher Education Review (HER)6 conducted by QAA to which all providers of higher education are subject, be they Universities, Further Education Colleges or private providers with degree awarding powers, asks questions of institutions about their library service and its role in enhancing the learning opportunities of its students. As part of the HER methodology there is a judgment on the quality of learning opportunities and on enhancement.
The outcomes of the HER are informed by the expectations outlined in the UK Quality Code. As we have seen, Part B of the Quality Code focuses on student learning opportunities through from programme development and review (B1), learning and teaching (B3), assessment (B6),
student development and achievement (B4) and through the expectations set out in the Quality Code raises questions about student learning opportunities and how the library and associated services meet the learning needs of the institution’s students. If we look at B3 this requires ‘HE providers, working with their staff, students and other stakeholders to articulate and systematically review and enhance the provision of learning opportunities and teaching practices so that every student is enabled to develop as an independent learner, study their chosen subject in depth and enhance their capacity for analytical, critical and creative thinking’. The HER process in testing this expectation may wish to know how the service provided by the library enables this expectation to be met: for example the qualifications and experience of library staff and how their staff development needs are identified and met; the evaluation of the service; the learning environment, physical, virtual and social; the support provided to students. Does the library service have a role in developing the institutions academic staff? If so what is it, and how is it evaluated?
Expectation B4 requires ‘Higher Education providers to have in place, monitor and evaluate arrangements and resources which enable students to develop their academic, personal and professional potential’. Again the library services may need to explain their role in enabling student development, particularly where they have an input into the development of study skills, digital literacy, and research skills and how their staff are appropriately qualified to undertake these activities. It is also within this particular expectation that questions may be asked about the quality and suitability of learning resources and the support provided to students to enable them to use them.
We would argue that the impact of QAA review should not be underestimated. Under the HER methodology there are four judgments relating to learning opportunities: commended, meets, requires improvement and does not meet. The last two judgments are ‘failing’ judgments and have serious implications for institutions, not least that the frequency of review will move from 6 years to 3 years and the institution will be unable to use the QAA ‘kite mark’ until they have been given a clean bill of health. As part of the review process reviewers speak to a wide range of students both on and off campus, full and part-time, undergraduate and postgraduate, taught and research, to reflect the diversity of the student body. They will also meet with the Head of Library Services and possibly staff involved in skills development where that is a service provided by the library. The purpose of these meetings is to triangulate the views of those
who meet the review team with the evidence base. At the very least students will see the HER as an opportunity to place leverage on institutions in relation to things which they perceive as key issues. The possible downside of HER is that it tends to put innovation on ‘hold’ until the review period is complete.
Whilst the Higher Education Funding Council7 is currently consulting on the quality assurance of higher education and whether QAA will continue to be contracted to undertake this work, there is little doubt that government will expect there to be a review process and appropriate body tasked with implementing it to ensure that internationally UK higher education continues to be seen as excellent. Furthermore many countries have their own equivalent quality assurance body and review methodology and in some cases look to the United Kingdom to advise on HER, for example, Mauritius,8 Singapore,9 Australia,10 Europe.11
IMPACT
So what impact do institutions’ quality assurance processes and frameworks have on library services? Are they the most effective way in quality assuring and enhancing library services? For some staff, both academic and professional support, internal quality assurance policies and procedures are perceived as overly bureaucratic – barriers to academic freedom and hurdles to be surmounted. However, such frameworks where they are well established provide institutions with a range of checks and balances through validation, monitoring and review which allow the student voice to be heard and in turn lead to enhancement of student learning opportunities. For example, one issue common to many HE institutions has been library opening hours with students demanding longer opening hours even though the reality is that only a few students may want physical access to the library at 2.00 in the morning. The response of library services has been to respond positively to such requests in a manageable way. Likewise access by students to materials off-campus has been facilitated by responding to the student voice.
However, whilst these processes provide leverage for students and indeed staff, they are not necessarily the most effective means of quality assuring and enhancing the library service. Certainly the view of Karen Tang (2013) is that excellence is achieved outside traditional quality assurance processes.
