CHAPTER 7 ACADEMIC PROGRAMS AND CURRICULUM
SECTION 3: PROGRAM REVIEW
(To see who has authority to approve changes to this section, please see the Approval of Changes page).
The effective evaluation of student learning within academic programs should provide the foundation for decision making within a sponsoring unit, serving to identify strengths and challenges, inform requests for additional resources (such as FTE positions; classroom, lab space, and other facilities; library material, or computing equipment), and guide planning efforts. Consequently, the process of program review builds upon the on-going assessment of student learning through the program assessment process described in Section 2 of this Handbook chapter.
Program* review will be an integral part of faculty governance through the Program Review Subcommittee (PRS), a permanent subcommittee of the Academic Affairs Committee (AAC) responsible for conducting all local program* reviews. The purposes of program reviews are 1) to provide each sponsoring unit a formal mechanism to evaluate and communicate to appropriate decision makers the academic program’s strengths, challenges and needs; 2) to garner collegial support and perspective for meeting the unit’s needs; and 3) to evoke a commitment from administration concerning continuation of the unit’s program(s) and/or intent to address the identified needs. The goal will be to review the programs within each sponsoring unit every five years according to the Program Review Cycle drafted by the Associate Vice Chancellor for Teaching, Learning, and Strategic Planning, approved broadly by the AAC, maintained by the Program Review Subcommittee, and available on the Academic Affairs Committee webpage.
* Program is defined here as an academic degree program for which a specific Classification of Instructional Programs (CIP) code and major code is recorded in the UW System program array inventory (See here: https://www.wisconsin.edu/opar-frontier/uws-academic-majors/)
THE PROGRAM REVIEW PROCESS
Program review is intended to be a collegial and formative process that will take place in the following steps:
1. The faculty and staff of the unit sponsoring the program under review engage in critical analysis of the program’s performance. This “self-study” is an evaluation of the program’s curriculum, student success, facilities, faculty, and revenue from sources other than General Purpose Revenue (GPR) (e.g., non-GPR program revenue, grants, advancement, etc.) The sponsoring unit communicates its findings in a written Self-Study Report, using the template linked below. The sponsoring unit will send copies of the Self-Study Report as an electronic file to its dean, the provost, the chair of the PRS, and the chair of the Assessment Subcommittee.
2. An External Review is optional and may be requested by the sponsoring unit, dean, or provost. Units sponsoring a program for which an external review is being requested are directed to work with the Office of Academic Affairs to coordinate reviewer selection, visit schedule, and the reimbursement of associated reviewer costs.
3. The PRS will review the Self-Study Report, and the report of the External Reviewer, if applicable, and write an evaluation that includes its recommendations to the sponsoring unit and the administration. The evaluation should also address the quality of the curriculum, student success, facilities, and faculty. The committee will compile this material together into a single Summary Report to be submitted to the sponsoring unit for clarifications and corrections. Once the sponsoring unit has reviewed the Summary Report and provided clarification, the Summary Report is forwarded to the dean for the dean’s comment. The Summary Report is also shared with Academic Affairs Committee.
4. A meeting of the provost, the dean, unit leader(s), and chair of the PRS will be the final formal discussion of the PRS Summary Report. The provost then provides a written comment on the program review, to be appended to the PRS Summary Report. The dean will have the option of appending a second response to the Summary Report as well.
5. The PRS will then forward the provost’s comments, dean’s comments, and final Summary Report to the Academic Affairs Committee (AAC). Following acceptance by the Common Council of the AAC minutes, the provost will write a second response to the departmental review, which will include a final decision regarding the continued support of the program. This will conclude the review of the program.
USES OF PROGRAM REVIEW
Program review is intended to provide a primary source of information for administrative decisions regarding the sponsoring unit. A program review is current if the review was completed within the preceding five years. The reports are intended to be campus resources and will be available to anyone who requests them. The PRS is the custodian of the reports and the reports will be maintained in the Common Council files.
RESPONSES TO DELINQUENT REVIEWS
The program review reports are important planning documents that inform decisions throughout the institution. It is therefore important that the reviews and reporting be completed in a timely fashion. When a sponsoring unit fails to complete its self-study according to the “Reporting Cycle for Program Review,” it makes such decision making difficult. Therefore, the provost may hold all staffing and budgeting decisions for the delinquent sponsoring unit in abeyance. Extenuating circumstances can relax this policy, at the discretion of the provost, if they are communicated by the dean to the provost and PRS.