The teaching quality assurance process within the Department is implemented and ensured by the Staff-Student Liaison Committee and, as far as the degree programmes are concerned, by the Review Groups, in agreement with the guidelines laid down by the University Quality Committee.
The legislative framework of reference (and related documentation) on the self-evaluation and accreditation process can be found at the page http://www.anvur.it (AVA section).
A comprehensive overview of current legislation can be found in this document.
The Department of Economics and Management is equipped with a system for assuring and improving the quality of the education provided to its students, the main aims of which are:
- improvement of orientation initiatives aimed at presenting the programmes, courses and services on offer so as to allow secondary school students to be able to make better informed choices;
- strengthening of in-course guidance and tutoring services in order to fast track students’ careers and to curb drop-outs and changing of chosen course of study;
- growth in international student and lecturer mobility activities to be implemented through the ERASMUS plus programme and bilateral agreements with non-European partners;
- the increase in the number of students benefiting from study and work opportunities abroad within the ERASMUS Plus and Jean Monnet programmes;
- the implementation of e-learning methods of delivering classes to improve the availability of educational materials;
- strengthening contacts with external organisations and companies;
- the optimisation of educational planning to ensure the sustainability of the teaching on offer;
- strengthening of programmes and courses in English in order to attract foreign students;
- the establishment of specific services for Chinese students enrolled in the Department.
The quality assurance activities of the degree programmes take the form of:
- drafting of the Annual Monitoring Report
- drafting of the Periodic Review Report
- drafting of the Single Annual Assessment Form;
I) The Annual Monitoring Report of the Degree Programme
The Annual Monitoring Report of the degree programme, which replaced the Annual Review Report, contains a concise critical commentary on a set of quantitative indicators proposed by ANVUR to the degree programme with the main purpose of prompting reflection on the degree to which their objectives have been achieved. Each degree programme has identified, from all those proposed, the most significant indicators in relation to its specific character and objectives.
The indicators are provided in such a way as to allow the individual degree course to independently compare itself with courses of the same degree type (bachelor’s, master’s and single-cycle), in the same class and in the same geographical area in order to detect both its own capabilities and cases of strong deviation from national or macro-regional averages and to recognise critical cases through other elements of analysis.
The indicators are divided into 6 sections:
1) Teaching Indicators (Group A – Ministerial Decree 987/2016, attachment E);2)Internationalisation Indicators (Group B – Ministerial Decree 987/2016, attachment E);3)Additional Indicators for the assessment of teaching (Group E – Ministerial Decree 987/2016, attachment E);4) Study path and career regularity indicators (In-depth indicators);5)Satisfaction and employability (In-depth indicators);6) Number and Qualification of the teaching staff (In-depth indicators).
In identifying the goals to be achieved, all the degree programmes are recommended to favour those with a broad scope and which are long-term where appropriate, leading to effective improvements in discipline-based training of students. They should avoid improvement actions that are unrelated to the analysis carried out through the indicators, and demands which are generic or unattainable, or which are dependent on means and situations beyond the control of those managing the degree programme.
II) Periodic Review Report of the Degree Programme
The Periodic Review Report must contain an in-depth self-assessment of the performance of the degree programme based on the relevant QA requirements (R3), with a precise indication of the problems and proposed solutions to be implemented in the next period. It is typically drawn up at intervals of no more than five years but no shorter than one, depending on the duration of the degree programme, the frequency of accreditation and internal evaluation within the university (audits by the Evaluation Team [NdV]), the need to revise the teaching system, and in any case in preparation for a periodic accreditation visit. For the purposes of the periodic accreditation of the degree programme, the Periodic Review may be brought forward in the event that critical issues are detected, or on the recommendation of ANVUR, the Evaluation Team or the MIUR.
The Periodic Review Report primarily highlights the continued validity of the key principles of the degree programme and the management system used to achieve them. It then examines the relevance of the pertinent academic and professional profiles and their expertise, the educational objectives, the coherence of the degree programme’s learning outcomes as a whole and of the individual courses, and the effectiveness of the management system implemented.
The Periodic Review Report is divided into the following parts:
1 – DEFINITION OF THE ACADEMIC AND PROFESSIONAL PROFILES AND DESIGN OF THE DEGREE PROGRAMME (R3.A): Definition of the main academic and professional aspects of the figure that the programme hopes to shape, as well as the relation between the outgoing academic and professional profiles and the training courses offered.
2 – THE EXPERIENCE OF THE STUDENT (R3.B): Analysis of the aspects of teaching which focus on the student, analysis of the use of up-to-date and flexible methodologies and assessment of the skills acquired.
3 – THE DEGREE PROGRAMME’S RESOURCES (R3.C) Analysis of the availability of appropriate teaching and technical-administrative staff and service resources. Analysis of the adequacy of the facilities dedicated to teaching needs and their accessibility to students
4 – MONITORING AND REVIEW OF THE DEGREE PROGRAMME (R3.D) Analysis of the degree programme’s ability to recognise both the shortcomings and the improvement margins in its teaching organisation and to act accordingly. Ensure that the opinions of lecturers, students, undergraduates and graduates are duly taken into account and valued.
5 – ANALYSIS OF THE QUANTITATIVE INDICATORS: Comprehensive critical analysis of the series of quantitative indicators in recent years.
Each part is split into three sections:
- SUMMARY OF THE MAIN CHANGES SINCE THE LAST REVIEW
- ANALYSIS OF THE SITUATION BASED ON THE DATA
- OBJECTIVES AND ACTIONS FOR IMPROVEMENT
in which the strengths, challenges, possible problems and areas for improvement are highlighted, pointing out any improvement actions to be carried out in order to guarantee the quality of the education offered
The ultimate goal of the review is to promote the improvement of the effectiveness of the education provided to students.
In particular the work of the Review Groups included:
- analysis of the effects of corrective actions already taken in previous academic years;
- identification of the strengths and/or areas for improvement revealed by the analysis of the quantitative data (entry into university life, regularity of studies, entry into the world of work) or problems observed or reported on the training course by students.
- identification of the subsequent steps to take in order to introduce corrective actions on the critical elements highlighted or to make improvements.
III) Single Annual Assessment Form
The Single Annual Assessment Form for the Study Programme (SUA-CdS) is filled out annually by the President of the SUA-CdS Committee, or another faculty member delegated by him/her, who is the only person authorised to access the SUA-CdS form from the faculty site reserved for him/her (https://loginmiur.cineca.it/) using his/her own Cineca/Faculty/MIUR credentials. The SUA-CdS gathers information of the activities of every study programme, to be used for communication with stakeholders and for all self-evaluation and external assessment activities. Its implementation constitutes one of the system requirements for the Quality Assurance of Education.
The form is made up of the following sections:
- The ‘Quality’ section gathers all useful information on the demand for education, the educational pathway, the expected learning outcomes, the roles and responsibilities involved in the management of the course’s quality assurance system, the conditions for the periodic review of the structure of the degree programme and any corrections identified;
- The ‘Administration’ section collects data on the institution (RAD) and previous launching of the course (OFF.F), allowing a switch over to the new information management system, which is set up as an ‘integrated’ communication platform that allows the same information to be conveyed to all recipients of the communication process.
The public segment of the SUA-CdS form for every study programme can be found on the website Universitaly in the Programmes and Courses section.
Teaching Evaluation Questionnaires
The questionnaire for evaluating the teaching is available exclusively online, by going to the address https://esami.unipi.it
To access it you must log in with your university credentials (Alice login and password).
The system ensures that the evaluation is completely anonymous as it is set up in such a way so as to avoid any link between the authentication phase and the evaluation phase.
The evaluation is compulsory to finalise the online registration for exams, as required by the National Agency for the Evaluation of Universities and Research (ANVUR). In order to make the data collected as complete and meaningful as possible, it is advisable for attending students to complete the form before the end of classes or immediately after they have finished, regardless of whether they have registered for examinations.
A summary report of the results for the previous academic year of the study programmes can be found on the individual course pages in the ‘Further information’ section.
The average scores for the individual teaching assessments can be consulted by students within the Valutami portal by selecting Report.
It only takes a few minutes to assess your degree’s courses: students’ feedback is invaluable for improving the quality of the University’s education and services.