Things you need to know:

If you’re considering applying to participate in AQIP, you must first schedule a conference call with Steve Spangehl. The call is to clarify the application process, answer your questions, and discuss any concerns you might have regarding the application requirements, or participation in the Program. And to make sure that your schedule and AQIP’s fit together. Call Neil Yoke (800-621-7440 x109) to set up your call.

Mark your calendar:

2006 Deadlines for Applying to Participate in AQIP: March 13, for April 24, 2006 action; May 8, for June 26, 2006 action; Aug. 21 for Oct. 26, 2006 action; Oct. 23 for Dec. 4, 2006 action.

Scheduled 2006 Strategy Forums: March 8-11; May 17-20. If you are applying to participate in AQIP and have a certain Strategy Forum date in mind, you must first check availability with Neil Yoke.

Crafting your Systems Portfolio Workshop March 16-17, 2006, Marriott Hickory Ridge Conference Center, Lisle, IL. See the Upcoming Events link on the AQIP Website for further details. Registration ends Feb. 6.

National University Telecommunications Network (NUTN) 2006: Managing and Maintaining Quality in Distance Learning Building on Solid Foundations, June 10-12, 2006, Radisson Plaza Hotel, Minneapolis, MN. Steve Spangehl will host a panel on Quality Based Approaches to Assuring and Improving Quality in Distance Learning. For more information or to register, visit the NUTN website at www.nutn.org.

National Consortium for Continuous Improvement (NCCI) Workshops

• Containing Costs And Enhancing Services Through Strategic Alliances and Partnerships, February 12, 2006, Century Plaza Hotel, Los Angeles, CA;
• Transformations That Are Working In Higher Education, March 27, 2006 MIT Campus, Cambridge, MA;
• 2006 7th Annual Conference. Collaborative Solutions: Plan* Implement*Assess*Lead! July 6 - 9, 2006, Sheraton Waikiki Hotel, Honolulu, Hawaii. For information and how to register for any of these NCCI workshops, visit their website at www.ncci-cu.org/.

AQIP welcomes the submission of articles or announcements for the AQIP newsletter. Please send yours to mfleming@hlcommission.org.

We need out-of-the-box thinkers to join us in perfecting this critical element of the AQIP Process. (“Imagineering” is the word the Disneyworld people use to describe their process for using imagination freely in the design of new rides and attractions.) To participate in this group brainstorming, you need first to download the Quality Checkup Guide from the Quality Checkup Visit category in the Downloads section of the AQIP website at www.AQIP.org.

The Quality Checkup Guide is an early conceptual blueprint that summarizes the purposes and goals of the Quality Checkup — why we need to conduct these visits and what we hope they will achieve. But translating this theoretical concept into a series of real world activities represents a major challenge. We intend to hold a few pilot visits this spring, and begin next fall to conduct a full program of Quality Checkups. We plan to invest more effort in coming up with a spectacular design for these visits — instead of rushing “into production” with a visit model that incorporates all the things that make traditional accreditation site visits so tension-producing for many institutions. You can help us develop this spectacular design.

Our vision here is to create a new type of accreditation visit, one that institutions look forward to with anticipation, enjoy while its happening, and look back on as a “turning point” in their institutional history. We want the institution to perceive the AQIP Reviewers who visit as perceptive, critical and supportive friends of the institution, people there to help the institution understand itself and take actions that will move it toward actualizing its mission, vision, and potential. I envision the Reviewers sitting down with various groups of people from the institution to talk through critical topics — leadership, planning, institutional performance evaluation (including assessment of learning), and others — primarily by asking probing questions, listening critically to how people respond, and following up with questions that cut to core institution issues, assumptions, and values of the institution.

These Quality Checkups are not visits an institution can “fail” (although, like a medical checkup, they could result in uncovering problems not appreciated previously), so the atmosphere surrounding them ought to be positive. (There are some “housekeeping” chores, described in the Guide, which these visits must accomplish, but they shouldn’t be the focus.) The institution visited will have to be a major partner in planning the visit — identifying the dialogues it wants to occur by giving us input on both the questions it wants us to ask and the people who should be present for each conversation. As we begin to think through how to make this vision a reality, go to the AQIP Forums on our website (or direct your browser to www.ncahigherlearningcommission.org/forums/) and join the discussion. To begin, suggest questions to drive the on campus dialogues (e.g., How do you determine what your students should know when you graduate them?) and which institutional people should be present at each dialogue.

The AQIP Forums are redesigned and ready for your input. We’d like your comments and suggestions about Systems Portfolios, Quality Checkups and other exciting AQIP topics. If your school is a participant in AQIP and you haven’t yet become and AQIP Reviewer, this is a great opportunity to get involved. While anyone can read what is posted in the Forums, to post something, you must register first. For instructions and tips on navigating the forums, see the Overview section of Downloads on AQIP’s website.

AQIP is always looking for success stories and learning opportunities, so we took a few minutes to ask FHSU about what compelled them to involve six of their people in the Systems Appraisal process. Below are their answers. FHSU welcomes questions from other institutions wondering if their involvement is worth the cost and effort.

AQIP: So what made FHSU interested in supporting six people for Systems Appraisal Training?

FHSU: FHSU made the commitment five years ago to support both the AQIP structure and the larger quality improvement initiative that AQIP represented. No one would tell you that it has been easy or cheap, but it has been an excellent exercise for us to learn more about ourselves. The first thing that we learned was that AQIP is a team effort and cannot be supported without champions of the cause. One of the best ways we found to build champions was to support them in learning more about AQIP, specifically, and quality improvement, generally. The systems appraisal process seemed like a great way to provide that type of learning.

AQIP: From our experience, recruiting new appraisers is challenging. How did FHSU find the “magic potion” to entice folks into systems appraiser status?

FHSU: Contrary to popular belief there is no magic potion in Hays (but we think our water is very good). Our cultivation of fertile minds interested in improving an academic system is the key. If you attempt to “sell” Systems Appraisal Training as accreditation, then your results might be limited to a certain small population. However, if you approach the training as a means by which participants can both influence the process at home and help others through sharing their knowledge, then good things can happen. The benefit to the institution is immeasurable, and every one of our Systems Appraisers learns a great deal about AQIP as well as the specifics of academic quality documentation. Besides, Lisle is not such a bad place to visit, even in the winter, especially if it is on the Provost’s dime (appraiser’s expenses are
covered by the Provost’s assessment account).

AQIP: So who does FHSU tap for service as an Appraiser?

FHSU: The key is finding folks that have an active interest/involvement in improving their system/process AND who have a desire to see the larger FHSU and QI picture. Even with our level of involvement we have not had to resort to a ten-year staging model to accommodate all the requests. Be assured that those simple guidelines have served us well! Certainly, some of the best candidates we’ve seen have been full-time faculty, but many have been pulled from the other administrative areas like the library, academic advising center, and even the physical plant. Honestly, we just keep our eyes open and find people that are a little “fired up” about making a change, then we just help them along.

AQIP: In tight fiscal times...well, you know where we are going with this one.

FHSU: Whoever said that improvement was cheap? The cost is easily justified to a Board or a taxpayer - we’re investing in our intellectual capital so they can come back and help the institution. Perhaps another way to consider it…if one person attends training and comes back and provides one idea that even minimally improves a process in a critical system, then the money spent is well worth it. Any learning organization can easily see the value, and if you are not a learning organization, you need to learn how to become one. Our Systems Appraisers help in our own Systems Portfolio building process, and that value alone makes the expense justifiable.

AQIP: Please know that AQIP appreciates the commitment FHSU (and several other institutions) have placed on helping us perform Appraisals. By the way, is anybody available that can help with…?

FHSU: Well Steve, the thanks is really owed to the hard work of our appraisers: John, Patty, Rich, Mike, Chap, and Chris. We, like many of our AQIP brethren, are always willing to help as Annual Update Reviewers, Review Panelists, and in any other capacity that serves the academic quality cause. Tell us what you need and we’ll ask them to call Lynn or Chuck tomorrow!

AQIP: Are there any other insights you’d like to share?

FHSU: Our AQIP experience has been enhanced by our extensive participation in the Systems Appraisal process. If nothing else, learning what is working (or not working) at other institutions is a critical piece of building a better learning experience for all institutions. FHSU students have been directly helped by the involvement of our faculty, staff, and administration in the Systems Portfolio and Systems Appraisal process. Thanks for the chance to tell our story!

AQIP: Larry (lgould@fhsu.edu) and Chris (ccrawfor@fhsu.edu) are always ready to answer questions about how AQIP has worked at FHSU. Please feel free to contact them.

Colleges and universities now have two options for formally connecting their involvement in AQIP with participation in the Foundations of Excellence® program, a project of John Gardner’s Policy Center on the First Year of College in North Carolina. This outstanding program — now welcoming two-year colleges as well as four-year colleges and universities — helps institutions systematically analyze all aspects of the ways they interact with students during the first year of college in order to discover opportunities for institutional improvement.

First, institutions planning to apply to AQIP can participate in Foundations of Excellence® as the preliminary Self-Assessment that AQIP requires for admission. Foundations of Excellence® will take the institution through a structured examination of its students’ first year experience, evaluating a set of institutional systems and processes that determine key areas of institutional performance — how engaged students become, whether they persist or drop out, how much they learn. If an institution participates and agrees to shape at least one of its first Actions Projects around the issues the self-assessment identified, AQIP will recognize this participation as fulfilling its self-assessment requirement for admission.

Second, institutions that already are participating in the Foundations of Excellence® (such as AQIP members Ohio University or the University of Akron) or institutions that have already completed it (such as AQIP members Augsburg College or Missouri Western University) can build on their learning to structure and focus a formal AQIP Action Project. If done in consultation with AQIP, such institutions will be invited to participate in a series of Higher Learning Commission activities designed specifically for Commission institutions linking their accreditation activities with Foundations of Excellence®. These will include a networking and sharing workshop, and specific, focused feedback on first-year-related Action Projects from evaluators trained specially in working with such implementation issues and plans.

To learn more about the Foundations of Excellence® program, email its director, John Gardner, at gardner@fyfoundations.org. Information on the Foundations of Excellence® program is available from the Policy Center’s website, www.fyfoundations.org. For detailed information on formally connecting Foundations participation with AQIP, call Steve Spangehl at 800-621-7440, x106, or email him at sds@hlcommision.org.

Systems Portfolios are not Self-Study Reports. SSRs are created for only one purpose: to prepare for a site visit from an outside agency about to make a summative decision about an accredited institution or program. Rarely does an institution create a SSR for itself alone, and few make much use of the SSRs they create after the accreditors leave.

Superficially, a printed Systems Portfolio might resemble a SSR, but only to the naïve or inattentive. Typically Systems Portfolios are shorter — 100 pages is the maximum and most come in between 75 and 90 — while behemoth, 300+ page Self-Studies are not unusual. Self-Studies may be organized in a variety of ways (most into five chapters matching the Commission’s five Criteria for Accreditation) while all Portfolios address, in order, the nine AQIP Categories and the questions in each Category’s Context, Process, Results, and Improvement items.

More importantly, SSRs, created as they are for a single purpose, have a short shelf life; when the on-site evaluation ends, and the team makes its recommendations about accreditation, the report has served its purpose. Three years later, most people at the institution won’t remember what it was, or where to find a copy. But Systems Portfolios are ongoing, developing tools for thinking, managing, and problem-solving, permanent fellow travelers on an institution’s quality journey. If it’s using its Systems Portfolio well, an institution returns to it each year, month, and week, updating it by capturing in it changes and new developments in institutional goals, structures, activities, and performance results. At any given time, the Portfolio is a picture of an institution’s current reality — what its goals are, how it strives to achieve its goals, and what kind of results it’s getting from its efforts.

Colleges and universities are typically highly decentralized, loosely coupled systems. At their best, they are dynamic and creative places where ideas flourish, and where the best are translated into action. At their worst, they are places where the right hand doesn’t know what the left one is doing, and where the failure of potential colleagues to coordinate their efforts often dooms even the most desirable initiatives.

Why? Because in many institutions few have access to he big picture — what the institution is trying to achieve, how it is pursuing its goals, and what headway it is actually making. Faculty and staff who are collectively dedicated to the education and success of students often don’t share an accurate understanding of which students the institution is attracting, how it processes and treats them, or what effects its activities and services achieve. Everyone may know their job well, but few see how all of the jobs they and their colleagues do combine to create their institution. Yet all know that real change and improvement can’t occur effectively without an understanding and appreciation of how changing a part may affect the whole.

An effective Systems Portfolio will become a central resource for an institution’s faculty, staff, and administration — a shared explanation of both how things happen now and how the pieces relate to the whole. When people ask what they could do next to make the institution more effective at one of its explicit goals, the Systems Portfolio should provide an assembly of ready answers. A Systems Portfolio can help everyone understand any given activity, proposal, or problem in a college or university by documenting how current processes work, what results they achieve, and what else affects (or is affected by) the activity, proposal, or problem under consideration. Systems Portfolios communicate the expectation that institutional processes must be intentional, and need to exist for a purpose.

For an institution seriously striving for excellence, its Systems Portfolio can document its current levels of achievement. But a Portfolio can also help create a climate in which intentionality becomes the institutional norm. Intentional actions are those an institution thinks about before, during, and after it takes them. Intentional organizations are those whose decisions, policies, and actions are made by people who know what they want, what they are doing, and what can happen as a result.

Rather than merely “survive” with a hodge-podge heritage of policies, offices, reporting lines, activities, and programs that grew up without coherent purpose, the serious organization envisions what it wishes to be, and then determines those policies and practices that will achieve its goals most certainly and speedily.

The Portfolio-induced discipline of describing key current practices by explaining their purposes and results realistically trains an institution to think intentionally. No longer can people justify an existing program or policy saying “it was probably originated for good reason, and we’re safer not tampering with it if we don’t understand its function.” Nor can people continue the casual, accidental mantra for new, impulsive policies and practices: “it probably won’t hurt, and it may do some good, so let’s try it.” A Systems Portfolio pushes an institution to explain what a particular organizational process or structure exists to achieve, and then pushes it further to find out whether its processes are actually achieving their goals.

So if a Systems Portfolio is not a Self-Study Report, what is it? Some answers:

• It is an Atlas of the institution, a collection of maps showing how key processes work, how they relate to each other, how all the parts of the institution fit together to make it a coherent whole. The Systems Portfolio provides the names of landmarks — key people, programs, structures, groups — and describes their function in helping the organization achieve its mission. For both new and experienced employees, it shows how things connect, giving a panorama with which people can understand how their particular activities affect the whole.
• It is a data Almanac that reports the results of the performance of various processes, ideally in comparison with the performance of similar activities at other organizations. Using it, the institution can use performance gaps to determine whether it should be satisfied with, proud of, or working furiously to improve the things it does now.
• It’s an Encyclopedia that describes in depth the key processes that make an institution operate. And, like a good encyclopedia with annual yearbooks or new editions, it’s updated continuously so that it always presents an accurate picture of what people in a dynamic and changing organization need to know now. Like the Internet Wickipedia, an encyclopedia created by the contributions of a diverse group of people who can add to and revise entries and descriptions, a good Systems Portfolio presents the institution as it is seen from a variety of perspectives, not just one.
• It is a Resource Room where people in the institution can go to find out how a process, service, or activity works, what purposes it was created or maintained to achieve, how it is currently performing, who is responsible for overseeing its operation, and a host of related facts. By embedding hyperlinks in an online Systems Portfolio available on the institution’s website to all faculty and staff, an institution can ensure that all of its personnel have, at their fingertips, access to the information they may require to do their jobs effectively.

The road to quality is a long one, but as the Chinese proverb says, “a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.” Creating and making full use of your Systems Portfolio launches your college or university on an exciting journey.

With AQIP’s strong encouragement and support, the Minnesota State Colleges and Universities (MnSCU) is undertaking a project to develop software that will help AQIP institutions publish their Systems Portfolios and thereby receive greater benefits from their participation in a continuous quality improvement program. The eFolio Minnesota Institutional Electronic Portfolio Project, launched in July 2005 and controlled and funded entirely by MnSCU, offers support to institutions interested in electronically presenting and documenting both institutional and program accreditation materials. MnSCU’s effort is supported through its Academic Innovations unit in the Office of the Chancellor. Lynette Olson (651-649-5957, lynette.olson@csu.mnscu.edu) is the staff contact at MnSCU.

Presently eFolio Minnesota is deploying an AQIP Systems Portfolio template to interested institutions in the Minnesota State Colleges and Universities system. The AQIP template can be reviewed online at portfoliotemplate.project.mnscu.edu. The project’s ultimate intention is to develop templates to support PEAQ and other accrediting processes as well.

Both AQIP and MnSCU believe an institutional electronic portfolio can help to build a college or university’s “story” and community. It can provide a depth and breadth of connections among other System institutions as well as within the institution itself, its programs, and its constituents and to reinforce shared visions and commitments to its mission. As institutional electronic portfolio users begin to develop their sites, collaboration and key activities occur that bridge gaps between outcomes and strategic decision-making tied to both the Higher Learning Commission Criteria and the Minnesota State Colleges and Universities Accountability Framework. An electronic portfolio can help to document program and student learning competencies as well as the fulfillment of licensure competencies by students in specific programs. The existence of a Systems Portfolio is integral to AQIP’s helping an institution create a fact-based culture supporting its operations, decision-making, and planning.

The eFolio Minnesota project site www.portfolio.project.mnscu.edu contains a number of features, such as a site management guide, a gallery of institutional e-portfolios, online and print resources, and a PowerPoint presentation on institutional electronic portfolios. A list of features AQIP hopes to see incorporated in any electronic Systems Portfolio software is available at
portfoliotemplate.project.mnscu.edu and AQIP is maintaining a discussion forum for any higher educator who wants to contribute to an ongoing discussion of the development of Systems Portfolio software. MnSCU and AQIP wish to engage a variety of other institutions in discussions and dialogs to gain more information on needed software features and how to successfully implement an electronic Systems Portfolio. Join the AQIP Forum Systems Portfolio discussion to become involved.

The University of Central Oklahoma in Edmond is one of seven recipients of the 2005 Oklahoma State Quality Award. Oklahoma Quality Awards are presented to organizations that demonstrate significant progress in building sound processes and achieving improvement results through the application of performance improvement principles. UCO is Oklahoma’s oldest public institution, established by the Oklahoma Territorial Legislature in 1890. It offers a number of regionally and nationally distinct programs, and has a comparatively large student body that places in the top 10 percent of universities nationwide.

At the beginning of the New Year AQIP welcomed Courtney Hill to the staff. As Commission and AQIP Processes Facilitator, Courtney will be managing the institutional change process for AQIP and PEAQ, assisting in implementing and managing AQIP’s Quality Checkup visits, and managing the AQIP processes related to the 7-year Reaffirmation of Accreditation. Courtney holds a B.S. in Operations Management Information Systems (OMIS) from Northern Illinois University and an MBA from Keller Graduate School of Management. Courtney has been with the Commission since 2001.

Richland College in Dallas, Texas, is one of seven institutions in the Dallas County Community College District, is a national recipient of the 2005 Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award in education.

RLC has cultivated a history of pursuing organizational excellence. The college has received many awards, including the 2005 Texas Award for Performance Excellence from the governor’s office and the Quality Texas Foundation, the American Library Associations 2001 Library of the Future Award and the 2004 Excellence in Academic Libraries Award. The college also served as one of eight pilot institutions for the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools (SACS) new accreditation standards.

With a new year upon us, I’d like to take this opportunity to look ahead to what 2006 has in store for AQIP and its institutions. The year begins with Strategy Forums in February and March at the Marriott Hickory Ridge Hotel and Conference Center in Lisle, IL. The February event will host 13 returning institutions and will be the first time that every participant will have already completed a Strategy Forum, Systems Portfolio, and Systems Appraisal. I’m enthusiastic about the unique opportunities that this dynamic will present for the attendees, facilitators, and staff. In March 13 new institutions will take one of their first steps into quality. This will be the first Forum with all new schools in over a year and a half. For both of these events, the curriculum has been revised to reflect the feedback we’ve received from earlier participants and facilitators to make these events as useful as possible. I’m confident that these Strategy Forums will be among the best AQIP has ever conducted.

March also offers an excellent educational opportunity for those working on their Systems Portfolios. The Crafting Your Systems Portfolio Workshop is scheduled for March 16-17th in Lisle and registrations are being taken now. You will find more information about this workshop on our website.

In April, the Higher Learning Commission’s Annual Meeting convenes again in Chicago. AQIP will hold it’s second Colloquium in conjunction with the Annual Meeting on Saturday, April 1st. This is a great opportunity for all AQIP institutions and interested individuals to come together and learn more about AQIP from the people who work with it on campuses every day. Multiple sessions will be offered hourly with a wide array of topics and presenters. This event serves as a great opportunity to meet and network with other individuals, both experienced and new to AQIP and quality. I have no doubt that this event will be incredibly valuable for all in attendance.

With these great events coming up in the next few months and then a full calendar for the rest of the year, plenty of opportunities exist to learn more about AQIP and become involved in the Program. We are always looking for good people to join become AQIP Reviewers, Systems Appraisers, and Facilitators. With all of these great opportunities, we are certain that 2006 will see you expanding your AQIP universe.