There is an acknowledged gap in literature about how to make the method of developing an impactful curriculum effective ( Turner et al., 2021) and how to evaluate impact of the process (Bens et al., 2021) This bid builds on JISC’s survey findings (Knight & Beetham, 2022) of institutional curriculum design processes, which does not explore impact evaluation approaches, as well as the QAA Evidencing value in higher education beyond the metrics .  

This project aims to develop a curriculum design, review and evaluation framework with a set of supporting ‘pillars of impact’ case studies and resources to help key stakeholders to design and evaluate impactful curricula which enhances the quality of the student learning experience.  

Annala et al., (2023, p. 1) discuss ‘the critical role of social cultures and relationships’ in designing impactful curriculum and highlight the scarcity of research in this area. The continuous and rapid nature of curriculum reviews to address external sector requirements and the pressure to grow student numbers, often overlook the unseen labour from those involved in the re/design of the curriculum. To address this, the authors established the SEDA Curriculum Development network in 2022 which meets regularly to discuss the challenges and enablers of curriculum design and share best practice and resources.  This international community, with a wealth of diverse perspectives and intellectual capacity in curriculum development has over 100 members of central developers often working in the third space to support course teams in the process of curriculum design and evaluation. Often these colleagues are disciplinary but not educational specialists and may need support about how to design, review and evaluate their own curricula. 

We will build upon the JISC report (Knight & Beetham, 2022) by asking institutions in this network for some context about their curriculum design processes but focus mainly on impact evaluation to address the gap in the literature.