Agenda item

Report of the Principal, Guildhall School of Music and Drama.

The Board received a report of the Principal in respect of the  Academic Board, which was established under the Instrument & Articles of Government and reports to the Board of Governors. Governors noted that the Academic Assurance Working Group will consider this report and other quality documentation, at its next meeting, when it undertakes its Review of Academic Assurances. 

During the discussion the following points were noted:

1)     The Academic Board should give assurance on grade inflation to the Board, and not the Academic Assurance Working Group.  However, the Academic Board could appoint an urgent Task and Finish Group to consider the matter.  The Principal advised that he had chaired the Academic Board last week, where this had been discussed at length. 

2)     External Examiners recommend the full range of marks, which should not change the boundary classifications, but it was accepted that  a 10% rise in the number of ‘Firsts’ needs to be fully investigated.  The external examiners oversee the marking and attend programme boards, to gain assurance of standards.

3)     During the lockdown some music students, who had been required to record themselves, improved their self-learning in this area.    It had been suggested that a reduced number of social distractions, with less travel and more time devoted to studies, might have been a factor in improved grades.

4)     The gradings are final for 2021 but if a specific factor comes to light, notwithstanding the pandemic and lockdowns, it will be possible to mitigate in the future.  The Academic Board would be reporting to the Board in May 2022 on grade inflation and the  Principal advised that there had been similar experiences across the sector.

5)     Consideration used to be given to boundary variables within 0.5% of a higher classification and, in such cases, the overall standard of work would be given weighting.  However, the Academic Board agreed last year that balance and weighting were already built into the system, but  assessment criteria and learning outcomes could still be applied if there was a distortion. 

6)     Appendix B of the Academic Board’s Annual Report included comments from the examiners. There is a moderation process throughout the assessment regime, and both assessors and examiners have a role in the final recitals of music students, to ensure maintenance of standards.  If there had been some grade inflation, it might not have been due to a weakness in processes.

7)     The School are planning to streamline the Doctoral Programme to 50 – 55 students, to give a better research training experience and to manage supervisory capacity.   The programme had been built up with external supervision, in order to benefit from industry expertise and other sectors; to diversify the research culture of the School and plan for knowledge exchange. 

8)         The School recognises its duty of care for those students who do not fall under the remit of either Research England or the Office for Students, although one of them might have more intervention in the future.   The Head of Research praised the team for their work in terms of improved training and contact and pointed out that, in the most recent satisfaction survey, they received some 100% ratings.  There is a robust administrative process in place, which ensures that supervisors’ reports are  submitted on time

9)         The doctoral programme has a mixture of full- and part-time students, some self-funded, some benefiting from full or partial fee-waivers or fully funded studentships. The School plans to increase the latter between now and the next Research Excellence Framework. 

10)       The School is currently connected to Techno 2 and has been accepted as a pilot institution for higher education and arts, as part of a Culture Mile package. 

RESOLVED, That – the contents of Academic Board Annual Report for 2020/21 and, in particular the action plan, be noted.