UNIQUE

UNIQUe is a quality and benchmarking system developed over several years by a group of organisations active in and competent in e-learning.

UNIQUe offers a high quality institutional certification for outstanding use of ICT in learning and teaching, which is awarded to universities or institutes, after a process of self-assessment and external peer review, for renewable periods of three years.

Unlike many of the existing quality initiatives in the field who focus heavily on online instructional design, UNIQUe concentrates on the use of ICT to enhance educational provision and learning support, throughout the entire breadth of activity of the higher education institution. This approach demands an applicant to meet high quality standards for programme objectives, programme structure, content, resources and learning processes.

Any Higher Education Institution who is active in using technology to enhance the teaching and learning experience can benefit from UNIQUe certification. UNIQUe certification can be awarded to both full higher education institutions (such as universities, institutes for professional higher education, advanced vocational institutions, etc.) as well as individual institutes (operating within institutes of higher education, such as schools, faculties, etc.), subject to a number of eligibility criteria.

The UNIQUe certification process is structured in six very distinct stages and offers a formalised approach in each of the steps: (0) Inquiry; (1) Application; (3) Eligibility; (4) Self-assessment; (5) Peer review; (6) Awarding body; and (7) Continuous Quality Improvement

UNIQUe is made up of a set of 10 quality criteria divided into 3 areas, each with a number of criteria groups, which are comprised of a number of sub-criteria.

Area 1: Learning / Institutional Context

• Criteria 1: Strategy and e-Learning
• Criteria 2: Commitment to Innovation
• Criteria 3: Openness to the Community

Area 2: Learning Resources

• Criteria 1: Resources for Learning
• Criteria 2: Students
• Criteria 3: University Staff
• Criteria 4: Technology & Equipment

Area 3: Learning Processes

• Criteria 1: Quality of the Offer
• Criteria 2: Assessment of Learning
• Criteria 3: HR Development

The UNIQUe website is at http://unique.efquel.org/. The UNIQUe Guide, leading an institution through application, preparation and completion of a certification procedure, is available on request.

Status

The UNIQUe system and criteria have been based on nearly a decade of research into quality certification of technology enhanced learning. The certification was originally designed and developed in the framework of the EU-funded project UNIQUe by the European Foundation for Quality in E-learning, the European Foundation for Management Development (EFMD), the MENON Network, and EuroPACE.

The UNIQUe criteria themselves are based on ten years of research and development activities which included:

• Three European Commission-funded development projects looking into various aspects of quality certification of e-learning,
• A wide process of consultations with researchers, quality experts and European stakeholders
• A series of UNIQUe pilots tested the criteria and the process with ten Higher Education Institutions over two years
• The current set of criteria were further reviewed based on the feedback received by the first UNIQUe applicants, and from quality assurance agencies in Europe, as well as in Eastern Europe and the Middle-East.

Currently, UNIQUe is part of the EFQUEL quality services, a range of self-assessment and external review services offered to e-Learning and TEL providers. Up till now, ten institutions have received a full UNIQUe Certification.

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