Program Review and Quality Improvement

POLICY: 

School of Nursing programs, including their tracks, majors, and areas of concentration (ARCO) are reviewed triennially to assure compliance with the approved School of Nursing curriculum, and adherence to appropriate certifying body recommendations.

PROCEDURE:

1. Program Review, Revision, and Approval
   The degree program, tracks, majors, areas of concentrations, and sub-specialties are reviewed triennially. Each program track, major or ARCO is reviewed by the director/coordinator and presented to the appropriate Council for review. Any recommended revisions in program plans or courses will be forwarded to the School of Nursing’s Schoolwide Curriculum Committee for review. Revisions will be sent to Total Faculty Organization (TFO) for final approval.
2. Program Quality Improvement
   The School of Nursing Evaluation Steering Committee develops, reviews, and revises the School Evaluation Plan based on accreditation criteria and the School’s strategic plan. The Plan includes specific benchmarks for each criterion and strategic goal, the data sources used to measure achievement of the benchmark, and the frequency with which the benchmark is measured.
   
   Each year the benchmarks identified for that year are evaluated using the identified data sources and a quality improvement report is prepared.
   
   The Director of Evaluation completes the evaluation of School-wide benchmarks and completes the quality improvement report (QIR). The NOT MET benchmarks of the School-wide QIR are presented to the Evaluation Steering Committee. After incorporating any recommendations from the Committee, the QIR is presented to Dean’s Council, which is responsible for developing a quality improvement plan to address any benchmarks not met.
   
   Program-specific benchmarks are evaluated by the program council subcommittee made up of the ESC representative to the Evaluation Steering Committee and one or two other council members. The subcommittee completes the programspecific QIR and reports the NOT MET benchmarks to the council for action plans. The ESC representative brings the not met benchmarks and action plans to the Evaluation Steering Committee (ESC). Once recommendations made by the ESC are incorporated into the program QIRs, the Chair of the ESC presents that year’s QIR reports to Dean’s Council any benchmarks not met and the proposed action plans. The ESC Chair takes any Dean’s Council feedback and recommendations back to the Committee. The ESC representative report back to the subcommittee with any edits/ suggestions to the action plans. The subcommittee develops a draft quality improvement plan for any benchmarks not met. The QIR findings and draft improvement plan are presented at a program council meeting for discussion and finalization of the quality improvement plan for all unmet benchmarks.
   
   All unmet benchmarks and their quality improvement plans become part of the next years QIR and data are collected to examine the impact of the quality improvement initiative on the benchmark.
   
   Individual councils, programs, majors, areas of concentration and satellite campus sites will initiate additional quality improvement initiatives based on identified needs or interests.