Professional Statutory Regulatory Body accreditation

Professional Statutory and Regulatory Bodies (PSRBs) are external bodies which accredit, recognise or approve programmes many of which lead to a professional or vocational qualification or exemption from a professional examination.

A PSRB ‘accredited’, ‘recognised’ or ‘approved’ programme may convey, or be a step toward obtaining a licence to practise in a particular regulated profession; and/or it may confer full or partial exemption from professional qualifications.

Professional, Statutory and Regulatory body accreditation usually entails an inspection of provision, either through a visit involving relevant programme and Faculty staff and PSRB representatives or through scrutiny of programme documentation. It is often given for a specific time period, after which there has to be further inspection to retain the accreditation/recognition/approval.

The University encourages Schools to seek and maintain appropriate PSRB accreditation or similar recognition for its programmes of study.

Quality Assurance

Since accreditation/recognition/approval often requires Schools to submit programme documentation for scrutiny, Schools may consider it appropriate to tie the accreditation/recognition/approval process is in with the Programme Approval and Review process thereby preventing unnecessary duplication of effort.

Responsibility for the preparation of documentation required for programme accreditation/recognition/approval by PSRBs and for making arrangements for visits, (where applicable) rests with the relevant programme team within Faculties. Advice and information should be sought from the Faculty Curriculum and Quality Assurance Team and QSAT as appropriate.

Reporting and Monitoring

The School Programmes Committee will:

• receive and consider updates from external review and/or accreditation of taught and taught parts of research programmes by Professional. Statutory and Regulatory Bodies.
• receive and consider updates from Professional, Statutory and Regulatory Bodies regarding changes to accreditation requirements.
• raise any issues about University-level processes or procedures, identifies serious concerns, or if accreditation is withdrawn following a PSRB visit, this should be drawn to the attention of AQSC.
• monitor and implement requirements and actions resulting from approval/ accreditation events.
• maintain, in partnership with Faculty CQA teams, a record of all programmes of study accreditation/recognition/approval by PSRBs. The records identify the details of the PRSB and the type of accreditation/recognition/approval and dates of validity, the responsible individual and their role.
• QSAT will extract this information directly from the Curriculum Management System, confirm its accuracy and present annually to AQSC.