The Quality Enhancement Plan (QEP) is a component of the accreditation process that reflects and affirms the commitment of an accredited institution of higher education to the enhancement of student learning.
According to SACSCOC, “The concept of quality enhancement is at the heart of the Commission's philosophy of accreditation. Each institution seeking reaffirmation of Accreditation is required to develop a Quality Enhancement Plan (QEP). Engaging the wider academic community and addressing one or more issues that contribute to institutional improvement, the plan should be focused, succinct, and limited in length. The QEP describes a carefully designed and focused course of action that addresses a well-defined topic or issue(s) related to enhancing student learning.” (http://www.sacscoc.org/genaccproc.asp)
To develop a QEP, the TSTC Executive Management Council designated a leader, Debbie Karl and later a Steering Committee. As a prelude to the appointment of the Steering Committee, Ms. Karl and Celina Garza, Vice President of the SACS Accreditation Office conducted a process that resulted in the determination of a QEP topic: Improve students’ job readiness for the attainment of gainful employment upon graduation. The QEP Topic aligns with the TSTC’s Board of Regents first Wildly Important Goal (WIG).
WIG 1: Increase the number of TSTC graduates from 2,949 in 2016 to 3,200 by 2021.
Attainment of this QEP overarching goal will be supported by projects, strategies, and interventions. Furthermore, a comprehensive QEP Evaluation Plan identifies how attainment of this overarching QEP goal will be assessed and evaluated for success. It also operationally defines measures; for example, what the college considers as “gainful employment and job readiness” for purpose of our QEP. The baseline data would involve students found working as of fall 2019. Data will be compared each fall for five years (through fall 2025) to determine success rates. Intermittent data will be collected to determine how targeted programs are doing and
adjustments/improvements made accordingly