Quality Tide Rising

Dialog Online, UA Faculty & Staff News

Quality Tide Rising:
UA Finalist in Alabama Quality Award

Along with other significant recognition this year, including ranking in the Top 50 Public Universities by U.S. News and World Report, UA’s recognition by the Alabama Productivity Center as a finalist in the Alabama Quality Award competition is another important indicator of quality improvement across campus. UA is the first national research university to achieve finalist status in a state level quality award review.

The Alabama Quality Award evaluates educational institutions, health care providers, and businesses using the standards set in the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award. UA’s Quality Council wrote a self-assessment of the University, using the Alabama Quality Award Criteria for Education, and submitted the assessment to a panel of judges that reviewed the assessment and determined that the University merited a site visit. In September, a team of quality professionals from across Alabama visited the campus and interviewed deans, faculty, students and administrators.

Several factors led to the University’s recognition as an Alabama Quality Award Finalist.

UA has a strong strategic plan (the White Paper) and can show significant progress in all of the major improvement areas in the plan.
UA has an active process for obtaining feedback from key stakeholders, such as faculty, students, parents, staff and alumni, and responsive programs to address stakeholders’ concerns.
UA is actively listening to outside perspectives. Each College has an advisory group that provides feedback from their profession. The University conducts focus groups with major employers in Tuscaloosa and Birmingham.
UA has one of the best systems for the review of academic programs in higher education. Every academic program has either an external or internal review process in place to ensure quality.
UA can show dramatic improvements in results in key areas. The University’s performance is outstanding in many areas when compared with other Alabama universities and with universities in the surrounding states. UA shows improvement in graduation rates, freshman retention, the academic credentials of incoming students, the number of honors students, research funding and many other areas. The University compares extremely well with other major southern universities in the number of classes with fewer than 20 students, and UA is the lowest in its peer group of research universities in the number of classes with more than 50 students.
UA can show a wide range of examples where staff, faculty, and students have worked together to assess and improve processes such as enrollment, student financial aid, library services, police services, advising, student health services, student recreation programs and many other areas.
UA has feedback from students, parents, and alumni to indicate a high degree of satisfaction with the quality of course work, the caliber of faculty, student accessibility to faculty, and the manner in which academic and support programs equip students for success after graduation.