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Procedures: Academic Program Review

A summary of the policy and procedures related to academic program review

Procedures

The university's Academic Program Review website has complete details on program review, including policy, procedures, timeline, templates and resources, and relevant contact information. Following is a summary of information and resources presented on the website.

Overview

Academic program review provides a valuable and periodic opportunity to assess each academic program’s quality and effectiveness, stimulate planning and continuous improvement, and encourage strategic development. It also provides the opportunity to examine program strengths, deficiencies, relevance, and goals. Program review fulfills accreditation and state requirements and assures institutional quality to students, faculty, staff, parents, alumni, and other stakeholders. It is essential that the university, schools and colleges, departments, and programs make appropriate use of the results.

Both the UW System Board of Regents and the Higher Learning Commission (the university’s accrediting body) require a regular practice of program review and reporting. This policy establishes the structure and procedures for academic program review within an established timetable and states the requirement for annual reports to the University Academic Planning Council and the UW System Board of Regents.

Policy

All academic programs, including degree/majors (i.e., academic plans), named options (i.e., academic subplans), certificate programs (i.e., undergraduate, graduate/professional, and capstone), and minors must be reviewed at least once every ten years.

The first review for new academic programs (i.e., degrees/majors, named options, certificates, and minors) is required five years after implementation. The date for the five-year review is set at the time of initial program approval and implementation. After the initial five-year review, continuing academic programs must complete a program review at least once every ten years.

The Graduate Faculty Executive Committee (GFEC) also requires a Three-Year Check-In report three years after implementation of graduate-level programs (i.e., degree/majors, named options, certificates, and minors).

Process

Academic program review is a five-step process at UW-Madison, for both five- and ten-year reviews.

  1. Initiation of Program Review

  2. Self-Study Report

  3. Review Committee

  4. School/College Discussion and Dean’s Final Summary

  5. Completion of the Review

Specialized Accreditation

Specialized accreditation reviews are conducted by professional organizations and typically require a self-study and an outside evaluation team. For programs with specialized accreditation (e.g., business, engineering, medicine, nursing, pharmacy, law, and veterinary medicine), the accreditation review meets the university’s requirement for academic program review. In such cases, the dean should complete Step 4 of the Procedures (i.e., write the dean’s final summary) to satisfy the university’s academic program review requirements. The dean’s final summary should be accompanied by the self-study report as submitted to the accrediting body, the accrediting body’s review committee report/findings, and any response submitted by the school/college/program. The documents should be sent to the Office of the Provost (copy to the director of Data, Academic Planning & Institutional Research) and, for graduate program reviews, the dean of the Graduate School. Because accreditation review does not address all the issues of interest to the Graduate School, graduate-level programs with specialized accreditation must also complete the Graduate School’s Supplementary Graduate Program Review Process.



Keywords:
accreditation, self-study, committee, review, HLC, GFEC, program review, academic program review, departmental review 
Doc ID:
118805
Owned by:
Karen M. in Academic Planning
Created:
2022-06-01
Updated:
2025-05-21
Sites:
Academic Planning