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DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION
HIGHER EDUCATION MANAGEMENT
INFORMATION SYSTEM
CIRCULAR 5: August 2005
1 Coding of courses that appear in
both diploma and degree programmes 3 Reporting of foundation programme students 4 Reporting of student outputs in
second HEMIS submission 7
Use of year n graduates for calculating
course credit values 8
New Qualification code for University UG
Dip/Certs of 2 years
2 Funding and awarding of exit level
qualifications
5 Course census day files
6 Further consideration of the
definition of “active student”
In
HEMIS Circular 2 (dated October 2002) the Department laid down this directive:
If a course
is offered at a number of levels, then it must be coded at the lowest
level at which it may be taken.
The
directive arose in the context of courses being offered in both postgraduate
diploma and masters degree programmes and being coded
at masters-level only. The issue of whether this directive has to be applied in
the case of undergraduate diplomas and degrees has been raised by an
institution.
The
Department has decided that it must issue the following clarification to this
directive
The
directive must continue to be applied at postgraduate level in the following
circumstances:
·
If
any course appears in the curriculum of both a postgraduate diploma and a masters degree, then this course must be coded at
preparatory postgraduate level, which has a weighting for subsidy purposes of
1.
·
If
a course appears in the curriculum of both an honours
degree and a masters degree, then this courses must be
coded at lower postgraduate level, which has a weighting for subsidy purposes
of 2.
The
directive must be applied in the following ways at undergraduate level:
In response to queries from higher education
institutions on the awarding of exit level qualifications, Tthe
Department is responding as follows:
2.1 Qualifications
are to be awarded by institutions to mark the achievement of defined outcomes,
not as compensation for failure at a higher level, or by default.
2.2 If consistent with the
qualification design, a qualification with two
tiers may enable a successful student to exit
with a less senior qualification having completed the first tier provided
that
this student has indicated that he/she
does not intend re-registering at the institution.
Institutions
are reminded that there are no provisions in HEMIS for the specific reporting
of foundation students. Institutions must note the following:
3.1 No
foundation qualifications, for example those described as “foundation
certificates” or “extended bachelors degrees, have
been approved by the Minister of Education.
3.2 It
follows that any person enrolled in a foundation programme can be reported in
HEMIS as a student only if he/she satisfies these conditions:
·
He/she
must be in possession of either a senior certificate with endorsement or
certificate of exemption, or a senior certificate without endorsement, or be
admitted at Senate’s discretion.
·
He/she
must be enrolled for a course which is included in the curriculum of at least
one qualification which has been formally approved by the Minister of
Education.
·
He/she
must have been active in that course on and before the census day prescribed by
the institution.
3.3
The category occasional
student can be used in reporting of foundation programmes only if those
involved in the programme satisfy 3.2 above, and if they are not
registered for a formally approved qualification.
Institutions
are asked to note that the glossary attached to Valpac
is misleading in that it suggests that professional first bachelors degrees must have minimum total times of 4
years or more. In terms of the 1995 edition of Report-116, professional first bachelors degrees can have a minimum
total time of 3 years.
The
Department has noted that a large number of professional first bachelors degrees have been placed in the category general
academic first bachelors degrees. This category
should include only degrees such as the BA, BSc, BCom
and BSocSc. Institutions are asked to check and
correct their qualification-type codings, and to
indicate to the Director of HEMIS whether major changes will need to be made to
their data submissions for 2004 and earlier years.
Some
institutions are not submitting full reports of their graduates/diplomates and of their degree credits in their second (or
March) HEMIS submissions. A consequence of this is that the Department is not
able to produce a full picture of the student outputs of the system for any
year until September of the following year. This is not satisfactory, as far as
national planning and funding analyses are concerned.
The
Department gives notice that it will require institutions to submit, from the
2006 reporting year, full output data in their second submissions (in this case
March 2007), and that funding sanctions will be imposed on those institutions
who do not comply with this directive.
The
Department asks institutions to note that the census day file of a course
cannot be treated as a “snapshot” which is not subject to later change and
amendment. Census day files can and must be amended to take account, for
example, of back-dated registrations and back-dated course cancellations.
7.1 HEMIS circulars 1, 2 and 3 laid down
various directives concerning “active students”. These directives can be summed
up in this way:
A student may be left on the census day file
of a course only if the institution has evidence that the student was active
during the period before census day. The nature of this evidence is left to the
discretion of the institution’s external auditor, but could include any one of
the following: the student (a) had submitted course assignments, or (b)
attended lectures, seminars, tutorials or practicals,
or (c) had written class tests, or (d) had raised study queries with an
academic staff member, or (d) had made use of a learning center. What would not
be acceptable as sole evidence of activity is the writing of the final
examinations in a course.
7.2 The Department believes
now:
·
that
the directive must be made stronger, particularly in relation to distance
education programmes, and
·
that its application should not be left to
the discretion of external auditors.
7.3 The Department gives notice to
institutions that a new directive, which will take account of quality assurance
strategies being developed by the HEQC, is under consideration. The new
directive would apply from the 2007 academic year.
8. USE OF YEAR N GRADUATES FOR CALCULATING
CREDIT VALUES
The following definition for course credit value in
the glossary of the Valpac Help documentation has
reference:
The method for calculating credit values in
universities is explained in Section J of this documentation. It should be noted that the procedures in
that appendix vary from the method used in 1998 for the SAPSE tables in the
following respects:
The
calculation for year n of credit values for courses which appear in the curricula
of undergraduate qualifications and for courses which appear in the
non-research curricula of postgraduate
qualifications must be based on the curricula of students completing all the
requirements for the qualification in year n-1.
The previous requirement that the curricula analysed be that of the
qualifiers of year n no longer applies.
The
calculation for year n of the credit values of courses which appear in the
research curricula of postgraduate qualifications must be based on the average
number of years taken by students completing the requirements of the
qualification in years n-1, n-2 and n-3. The previous requirement that this average
be that for years n, n-1 and n-2 no longer applies.
The Department is giving notice that as it is now
compulsory to submit a 3rd submission of student data, institutions may
use the graduates of year n to calculate credit values for non-research courses
provided that it will not delay the submission.
Similarly for the calculation of the credit values for research
curricula the average for the years n, n-1 and n-2 may
be used provided that it will not delay the submission.
9 NEW QUALIFICATION CODE FOR UNIVERSITY
UG DIP/CERT WITH TOTAL TIME OF 1 OR 2 YEARS.
From 2005 all university undergraduate diplomas and
certificates with an approved total time of 1 or 2 years must be coded 11 for
Element 005 (Qualification Type). This
is to ensure that the correct weighting is generated for these qualifications
in the teaching outputs of the new funding formula. The revised as well as the
old list of codes for element 005 is attached.