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| PCC is one of several Colorado community colleges that have chosen to pursue accreditation through continuous quality improvement rather than through the traditional decennial review process. Like the other participating colleges, we have associated ourselves with the Higher |
| Learning Commission’s Academic Quality Improvement Program (AQIP). AQIP provides resources and assistance to colleges interested in continuous, focused quality improvement, helping them learn to measure and assess the effectiveness of their processes.
Our quality improvement journey began during the self study process that led to the reaffirmation of our accreditation in 2001. This process involved all faculty, staff, and other stakeholders in an intensive, long term evaluation of every major aspect of our college. Our level of engagement, collaboration, and focus on improvement was widely regarded as meaningful and rewarding, and the reaffirmation of accreditation represented a career highlight for many faculty and staff.
Soon after the publication of our Self Study, we became aware of AQIP. Its focus on continuous quality improvement seemed a natural extension of the work we had already begun, and we enthusiastically endorsed the new approach. Though AQIP presents its own challenges, it is yielding many benefits similar to those of the self study: collaboration, learning, and change for the better.
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