On the afternoon of 19 September 2018, the Open University of China (OUC) held a video deployment conference on 2018 teaching inspection work in the cloud classroom at the Wukesong headquarters of the OUC. The heads and relevant personnel in charge of the quality and teaching work of branches, colleges, and industry and corporate colleges attended the conference via the video conference system.
The conference was presided over by director of the OUC Quality Monitoring and Evaluation Centre, Han Yi. Director of Teaching Affairs Department Ye Zhihong, deputy director Liu Yuxia, deputy director of the Quality Monitoring and Evaluation Centre Qi Wenxin, and personnel from other relevant departments attended the conference.
Ye Zhihong said that 2018 is a year of opportunity for the education field. The successive convening of the Ministry of Education’s (MOE) national education conference and undergraduate education working conference has given a clear direction for the elevation of higher education quality. The OUC has always adhered to the concept of “developing the university based on teaching quality" in order to "deepen teaching reform and improve teaching quality.” It focuses on connotation construction in order to promote higher quality work, issuing documents such as “relevant opinions on deepening teaching reform and improving teaching quality.” Teaching is a key part of quality assurance for the school, with teaching inspection an important means of quality assurance. The OUC should strengthen the supervision and inspection of teaching, promote the effective operation of the teaching process and learning behaviours, improve the teaching level and the learner support service level, and create first-class junior college and undergraduate majors for the open university.
Qi Wenxin and Liu Yuxia gave reports on teaching inspection and online teaching inspection for 2017 and deployed teaching inspection and online teaching inspection for 2018. In their report, they introduced the achievements made by each branch in 2017 in terms of the practice and exploration of the "Six-Network Integration" talent training model, teaching process implementation, the "One College Student Per Village Programme", teaching team construction, study centre setup and management, and daily online teaching and examination work. They also pointed out the existing problems in the system and required that each branch should further transform their ideas, strengthen system construction, promote the learning web application, promote the implementation of the teaching process, promote the effective operation of the teaching team, and improve operational efficiency and system file communication. The meeting also announced the teaching inspection content, key points, inspection methods, and time arrangement for 2018.
Han Yi analysed the national policy and region management requirements currently facing continuing education. She pointed out that external inspection, regional management and inspection, and evaluation work should all be strengthened, which will be conducive to promoting the improvement of the teaching quality the OUC. As part of their own internal comprehensive teaching inspection work, the leaders at all levels attach great importance to these tasks. The school system of each branch has carried out a lot of work in terms of regulated enrolment, examinations, the effective implementation of face-to-face tutoring and online teaching, strengthening system construction, and enhancing teaching/management capability through teaching personnel training. The overall quality level has improved and great progress has been made. However, some problem still existed and cannot be ignored. Two aspects should be addressed as part of this year's comprehensive teaching inspection. First, “winning at the terminal,” i.e. the focus of inspection should shift to the study centres. Second, the analysis and application of the effective implementation of quality factors and other data during the teaching process. Through a correlative analysis of data mining and teaching model reform, the branches should summarise their achievements and establish their deficiencies. In addition, during the self-inspection process, each branch should strengthen the effective implementation of key links such as pre-qualification of education, collection of fees, and teaching, as well as the self-inspection of related learning traces and supporting archives, with the goal of establishing a normal working mechanism.
Han Yi said that 2018 is a landmark year for the OUC in its transformation from scale development to quality-oriented development. As a systematic university, the OUC requires that every person at every stage of the chain, every branch, and every region make joint efforts. They should implement the spirit of successfully operating education specified by the 19th NPC National Congress, support the quality-oriented construction of the university, jointly maintain the reputation of the system university, build an education brand, make quality enhancement the focus, and strive to build a unique quality culture for the OUC.
By Chen Zejin, OUC