Academic & Administrative Audit

Introduction

Accreditation has been the most visible influence for reflective review within higher Education. NAAC, one of the professional accrediting agencies for most of the HEI’s in India, provides a regularized, structured mechanism for quality assurance and improvement through a process of Self-study and Peer Review. While each accreditation cycle is reflective of the functioning of an institution for a span of 5 / 7 years, institutions are expected to continuously improve their Academic and Administrative functioning irrespective of their current status.

Undertaking an academic and administrative audit from time to time will help an institution review the processes or procedures that the Administration and Faculty members use to provide quality education in their institution and department.

There are many approaches to review of an institution’s functioning. Xavier Board’s AA process does not try to second-guess decisions made by the stakeholders on curriculum enrichment, student enrolment, teacher profile, teaching-learning process, associated infrastructure, etc., nor does it attempt to “micromanage” the way teaching-learning is carried out or how the institution is managed. On the other hand it is a well thought of, curated, tested and comprehensive process.

The audit process is designed to verify the presence or absence of compliances and will look at practices and procedures that are detrimental to quality enhancement and sustenance.

The objectives of the XB-AA Audit are to:

Assess the role of administration and staff in promoting and sustaining the administrative environment and ethics required for teaching, learning, research and outreach,
Assess the academic strength, performance and professionalism of the faculty, and
Ascertain the status and the adequacy of the infrastructure to conduct teaching, research and co-curricular activities.

XB – AA Audit will

Provide an overview of the teaching – learning – evaluation process of the institution and the strategies adopted,
Make an objective third party assessment of an institution’s administrative policies, procedures and functions.
Assess the academic administration, decisions and executions, academic strength and professionalism of the faculty, infrastructure for teaching – learning, research and administration, facilities for staff and students, best practices and distinct characteristics of the Institution,
Verify financial compliance,
Assess whether the programmes and related activities are in consonance with the vision, mission, objectives of the Institution and its quality framework.

The process adopted by the XB – AA Audit is:

Opening meeting with the faculty,
Presentation of reports by the Principal and the Heads of departments,
On-site visit to the departments, centres and facilities,
Interaction with members of the Board of Management / Governing Board, parents and alumni/ae association, students’ representatives, administrative and supporting staff and other stake holders,
Perusal of documents in support of policies, procedures, programmes, and activities, and
Exit meeting with Management and Faculty.

Instructions for Completing Manuals

USER ID and PASSWORD will be sent to the Principal / IQAC co-ordinator of the institution after the contribution to XBHEI has been remitted by the institution
Information for the last 2 / 3 academic years alone need to be furnished in the audit manuals.
A period of 6 weeks will be given to the institution to complete both the manuals.
No extension will be permitted and the institution will have to forfeit the contribution in case it is unable to submit the manuals on time. Re-registration will have to be done in order to access the manuals beyond the stipulated date.
The manuals are deployed online and the same can be downloaded in MS Word format in case of need. Please avoid unnecessary use of paper for printing the manuals.
Please register each department before filling in the details of the respective department.
Audit reports are based on the answers furnished by the institution and the on-site visit of the audit team and hence, institutions must endeavour to furnish answers for atleast 95% of the questions which are important for a balanced, unbiased, detailed audit report.
If there are questions which are not relevant to the institution they need not be answered, since there is no rank or grade involved (E.g. questions pertaining to Autonomous Colleges.
Questions which are relevant at the Institutional level need not be answered once again in the Academic manual. For e.g. Vision and Mission of the department (if the department has one please give the info or just state ‘Same as College Vision and Mission’).
Please adhere to the word limit as the software is built accordingly. If answers exceed the word limit kindly upload them on the college website as a separate document.
Answers to queries may be completed in the manual (MS word format) and then copied and pasted into the online version.
Kindly save all the input using the SAVE button at the end of each section. Control keys such as Control S to save the work are not functional with the software.
You may Login and Logout as many times as required.
In case of any difficulty in filling in the information please contact the Secretary General.
All queries / complaint / assistance will be addressed at these times: Monday to Friday between 10.00am to 6pm.
The last date for submission for completing the manual will also be sent to the Principal / IQAC co-ordinator along with the User Id and Password. Kindly adhere to the last date for submitting the information to avoid technical and other problems.
Please share the contact details of the co-ordinator of the XB-AA Audit process of the institution with the Co-ordinator of Programmes of XBHEI.
XB does not require a hardcopy of the completed manual and hence it would be eco-friendly to refrain from taking multiple copies of the completed manual including for the on-site visit.
Institutions applying only for Administrative or Academic Audit are requested to download and use only the relevant manual for which the contribution has been made to XBHEI.
XBHEI works on the principle of trust and hence requests that no information of this manual maybe shared with any other person/s, apart from the College faculty and staff for the purpose of completing the document, or with any other institution.

Grievance and Appeal

An independent body comprising some of the Executive Board members of Xavier Board will look into any grievance or appeal, if any, made by the Institution with regard to XB-AA Audit process.

REQUISITION LETTER (to be given on institution letter-head/apply online)

From,
(Name of the Head of the Institution
With full postal address)

To,
The Coordinator,
XB -AAA Committee,
XBHEI,
31, Primrose Road, Bangalore 560025

Dear Co-ordinator,

Sub: Request for conducting XB – AA Audit in (name of the College).

This is to request XBHEI to kindly conduct an ‘ADMINISTRATIVE AND ACADEMIC AUDIT’ of (Please name the Institution / college) College. We will hereby abide by the terms and conditions of process as detailed by XBHEI and pay the Registration fee for the same. The institution will take responsibility for the travel, boarding and accommodation of the Audit team members during the Audit period as well pay the remuneration to them as per the rates detailed by XBHEI.

Thanking you,

Yours sincerely,

(Head of the Institution)

Xavier Board of Higher Education in India – XBHEI

Xavier Board of Higher Education in India – XBHEI