By Naomi Grew, Business Change Manager (IDG)

The Curriculum Management project, led by IDG under the sponsorship of the Education Strategy group, is preparing to move from the discovery phase to the delivery phase at the start of 2024. Work is progressing in preparation for this. The working vision remains:

“A single source of truth and definitive record for all curriculum data, with robust and well-structured technology, efficient processes and policies aligned to course, module and partnership creation, approval, deployment, and archiving to ensure both staff and students have an exceptional user experience.”

Completion of this project will provide a foundation for future developments and improvements across the student lifecycle, including module registration and assessment, where accurate, reliable, complete and joined up data is essential. The more immediate benefits are concerned with process improvement, whilst remaining compliant.

Discovery phase

The discovery phase undertook a thorough consultation of colleagues on the current processes involved in Course Approval and Module Approval, along with further investigation into more granular areas of curriculum production and deployment. This included operational activities, processes and roles involved in associating students with courses and modules, including route management, module diet management and module selection. The findings of all of these investigations have been put together to form the requirements for the project going forward.

An additional ongoing area of focus in this domain is the curriculum data dictionary, i.e. what is our common language for describing the curriculum, and how may this be enhanced to give students and staff consistency, whilst accommodating the rich variety of offerings the University provides?

Next phase

The discovery phase identified a number of strong candidate solutions to support us in business process development. Technology in this space has developed a lot in recent years, along with sector experience, which we can build upon. Before we make the decision to adopt one of these new solutions, we will need to plan very carefully how this will be implemented across the University in a way that brings benefits and minimises disruption. This will involve engaging further with departments to understand their readiness and appetite for change in this space.

Between now and the new year, the project is developing a specification for a new role to take on the comprehensive “Business Ownership” of curriculum management. One of the clear outcomes of the discovery has been to fully understand the complex activities that take place across several central teams and departments, together with a need to ensure that the right advice and guidance is provided, and that there is a clear single point of contact when issue and opportunities arise.