The Meaningful Enactment of Quality Assurance as Academic Integrity

1. The Meaningful Enactment of Quality Assurance as Academic Integrity Britta Zawada UNISA February 2019 CHE conference

2. Outline • Defining quality in HE and ODL • Defining a quality culture in HE and ODL • Some notes on the notion culture • Loci of quality in HE • Levels of quality in HE

3. Defining quality • The notion of quality in HE is elusive, relative and subjective (Doherty 2008: 256) • Quality as a noun in English refers to a neutral characteristic of something; it is a recent phenomenon that quality as an adjective means ‘excellent’, as in quality programme • Excellence is equivalent not only to quality but to high quality (Poole 201: 9) • The concept of quality is relative and contextual and differs between stakeholders, such as staff and students (Elassy 2015)

4. Defining quality (cont.) • Contrasting an objectivist, externally imposed conception of quality with a nominalist and contextual conception (Marshall 2016: 213) • Marshall (2016: 213) writes that “education is too complex and too important to be defined by a small number of qualities [italics – BEZ], relevant to a privileged group of stakeholders” such as, for example, using only financial efficiency as an indicator of necessarily high quality.

5. Defining quality (cont.) Marshall (2016: 215 – 217) then critiques the widely accepted parameters used in quality assurance (QA) frameworks: • quality as exceptional (similar to Poole’s excellence), • quality as perfection or as flawless delivery, • quality as fitness for purpose, • quality as value for money, and quality as transformation. (Note: these are the parameters used by the CHE) Marshall 2016: 213 – 214 notes the political nature of QA Frameworks and asks the following questions:

6. Defining quality (cont.) • Who defines the frameworks, sets the standards, ask the questions, and who ultimately benefits? • At what level of granularity is the framework operating, i.e. what is the unit of analysis (Zulu, Murray and Strydom, 2004: 208)? • Whose perspective of viewpoint is taken, and / or taken into account? • Is diversity and context sufficiently taken into account? • Is there organisational sense-making?

7. Defining quality (cont.) In its 2006 publication entitled Perspectives on Distance Education: Towards a Culture of Quality, the Commonwealth of Learning (Koul and Kanwar, 2006), Koul (2006: 186) defines quality in ODL (Open Distance Learning) as … comprising those of its attributes that not only promise but provideopportunities for a better quality of life for its takers, whatever their social context, and the communities / societies they work in and contribute to.

8. Defining a quality culture Zulu, Murray and Strydom (2004), in a study of lessons learnt in South Africa after the first cycle of institutional quality reviews, also identify • the biggest challenge of effectively implementing quality assurance in South African universities as the transformation of the academic quality culture, which is closely linked to • ownership by academics and training for understanding, to enable them to move from mere compliance to ownership.

9. Defining a quality culture Koul (2006: 187) defines a [quality] culture “as a way of life shared willingly by all the members of a social group” which is purposeful, shared and owned, and which shows commitment and diligence. According to Koul, the so-called props of QA are a necessary condition or input measure for a quality culture, but it is a committed and well-trained workforce that actually establishes it.

10. Defining a quality culture Ehlers (2009: 346) refers to two dimensions of a quality culture, namely • the “structural dimension (quality management handbooks, process definitions, instruments, tools) (in Koul’s terms, the props), and • the dimension of values of an organisation (relating to the commitment of its members, the underlying values, skills and attitudes).”

11. Culture? • Afunctional view of culture in which an instrumental apparatus … a system of objects, activities and attitudes [the props] …are interdependent…[and] are organized around important and vital tasks as described by Malinowski in 1944. • A semiotic view of culture, however, sees culture as not only a meaning-making activity, but as a public and therefore communal activity which results in so-called webs of significance as defined by Geertz (1973).

12. Building a Quality Culture at UNISA:Types of organizational culture • An adhocracy culture which is externally focussed, is flexible and adaptable and is driven by high levels of creativity, and pro-activeness • A clan culture which is internally focussed, is flexible, and characterised by high levels of trust and loyalty, teamwork, participation, and cohesiveness • A market culture which is externally focussed, is embedded in a planning regime with set objectives to create stability and control, is goal-orientated, task-driven, and is focussed on productivity, and efficiency • A hierarchy culture which is internally focussed, and which creates order, uniformity, stability and certainty through formal structures, rules and regulations, defined roles and responsibilities, standardization, and measurement (Trivellas and Dargenidou 2009: 387)

13. Types of quality cultures: (Harvey and Stensaker, 2008: 436 – 437) • A reproductive quality culture attempts to maintain the status quo at all costs, attempting to reduce the impact of external requirements; the focus is on taken-for-granted norms and practices that are thought to be best and are unlikely to be rethought. There is a high level of individualism and any attempt at open scrutiny or self-criticism or reflection will be met with resistance. • A reactive quality culture which is a culture of some sense of accountability which is driven by compliance, reacting to, rather than engaging with external requirements, based on positive rewards (or presumably also by possible negative censure in the case of non- compliance). The atmosphere is one in which the loss of trust and autonomy is mourned and where there is scepticism of potential improvements. • A responsive quality cultureis led by and engages external requirements in a positive sense, focuses on compliance but uses the opportunities created to maximize the benefits for renewal. • A regenerative quality culturefalls within the paradigm of a learning organization and makes full and coordinated use of all opportunities to actively plan for regeneration, renewal, innovation and creativity, using external reviews as opportunities for benchmarking and reflection which are a seamless part of everyday work. However, if the regeneration is interfered with, such a culture may become a site for the subversion of quality assurance practices…. (Veiga et al. 2014)

14. Loci of a Quality Culture in HE

15. Levels and types of a Quality Culture in HE

16. Conclusion Academic integrity as a holistic concept resonate with the increasing and deeper / higher levels of a quality culture, where an institution owes it to both its students and its staff to move from • a level of compliance, through • academic peer review, to • communities of practice, and ultimately to • transformative meaning-making, where excellence and innovation can flourish