External Experts
We look forward to your expertise!
As an external reviewer and 'critical friend', you have been invited to contribute your expert knowledge and experience to the further development of study programmes at the University of Göttingen's. With the information on these pages, we want to support you in your task in the best possible way.The Department of Student and Academic Services will support you throughout your participation in our quality management process and is available to answer your suggestions and questions.
We would like to invite you to watch this video to get an overview of your role as an external expert (german):
Basic features of the quality management system for Teaching and Learning:
The University of Göttingen's QM system is based on the centralised procedure and decentralised quality management, which are based on the University's particular strengths and traditions and involve all stakeholders.In regular quality rounds in the decentralised quality management of the faculties and institutes, the study programmes are examined and evaluated in detail. All stakeholders are given the opportunity to discuss the degree programme, its quality and its development prospects, work together on challenges and develop recommendations for action. The integration of your external expertise as a reviewer happens in these decentralised formats.
The results and proposed measures arising from the joint discussions and challenges are incorporated into the quality control cycle of the respective faculty.
The centralised procedure focuses on the internal accreditation decision. It is based off the results of the decentralised quality management. Your statements on the study programmes support the accreditation decision to a significant extent and are incorporated into the process. An ad hoc internal university assessment committee carries out the assessment and prepares a report with an accreditation recommendation. The Presidential Board then makes an accreditation decision based on your statements, the documents relating to the procedure, the assessment report and the faculty's statement on the report.
To integrate all of the approx. 200 study programmes they were grouped into approx. 60 subject-related clusters, as is customary for programme accreditation procedures.
Overall, the University of Göttingen's QM system is designed as a future-orientated "learning system" and enables a continuous process of adaptation and improvement. In particular, you as external experts are integrated at the degree programme level, i.e. the faculty level, and supervised by the Student and Academic Services Department.
When are you involved as an external expert? What are your tasks?
- Internal reaccreditation
- Initial internal accreditation of a new study programme
After you have accepted the invitation to be an external expert you will receive information on the study programmes of the cluster. You will then take part in the quality round of the decentralised quality management procedure at the faculty hosting the programmes. The quality rounds offer you the opportunity to enter into dialogue with all status groups and stakeholders involved in an open broad-based approach and to actively assess developments and challenges.
Following your participation, you will write your statement for each study programme, for which we will provide you with a digital questionnaire that is based in particular on the accreditation criteria and also gives you plenty of freedom to give us your views as a "critical friend".
We would like to suggest a time frame of 6 weeks after your participation for the preparation of your statements, individual coordination can take place in order to take personal circumstances (such as examination phases, holidays, etc.) into account.
Your involvement in an initial accreditation takes place exclusively in text form, meaning without an on-site visit. After your acceptance of our invitation, you will receive all relevant documents on the new degree programme/cluster as well as a questionnaire which serves as your statement for each study programme.
After the initial accreditation and the start of studies, all new degree programmes are assigned to a cluster, integrated into the decentralised procedure and the quality rounds and reaccredited internally in accordance with the accreditation deadline for this cluster.
What does the involvement process look like?
In this overview, you will find details of the process of your involvement in our QM system, the timelines, communication channels and tasks:
Download process diagram (PDF)
When does bias exist?
It should be noted that we cannot involve any academics from Lower Saxony as expert reviewers.
In addition, we base our procedures on the recommendations of the HRK (German Rector’s Conference) and DFG (German Research Foundation) on this topic. Biases include in particular
- first-degree relationship, marriage, civil partnership, marriage-like relationship and close personal ties or conflicts with members of the faculty concerned
- current or planned close academic cooperation with members of the faculty concerned within the last five years, e.g. joint publications
- official dependency or supervisory relationships (e.g. teacher-student relationship up to and including the postdoctoral phase (degree, doctorate or habilitation)) at the faculty concerned or, in the case of members of the faculty concerned, up to six years after the end of the relationship
- an imminent change to the faculty concerned
- employment or enrolment at the University of Göttingen
- Close academic collaboration with individuals in the relevant faculty, retroactively for up to five years
- in the case of cooperative degree programmes or joint degree programmes, also applies to the universities/research institutions involved in the degree programme
- Participation in application or appointment procedures of the faculty concerned, retroactively for up to five years
- Advisory activity in the design of the degree programme/cluster
- Membership of the University Council or scientific advisory boards of the University of Göttingen, retroactively for up to five years
- Participation in peer reviews within the last 12 months
What happens to your statements?
On the one hand your contributions are fed back to the faculties so they can be taken into account in decentralised quality management. This means that your suggestions are sent back directly to those responsible for the degree programme. They are used for the development of measures and are taken into account during the next quality round. The statements are essential in the further development of the study programmes.
On the other hand, your statements are integral part of the central internal accreditation procedure as the accreditation decision is based off of them.