The Quality Assurance Manual for an Engineering Course—a UK Example

SUMMARY Formal arrangements are being introduced in the UK for the academic audit of all university courses. It seems likely that in the future these will become normal practice throughout Europe. Procedures are having to be developed which will demonstrate the achievement of quality. Little guidance has been available so far on how to frame these procedures for engineering courses. Standards introduced in recent years for assuring the quality of products and services have emphasized the central importance of the Quality Manual. This paper gives an example of how the philosophy of these standards has been applied, in the framing of a quality manual for an engineering degree scheme. It has been necessary to define aspects of the scheme, such as its overall objectives, much more closely, so as to bring together procedures to show that the objectives are being achieved. A discussion is included of the procedures required for auditing, which is essential to ensure that the quality control loop is closed. Attitudes to the introduction of the manual are reported briefly.