Teaching Excellence Framework (TEF) 2023

The University College of Osteopathy is pleased to announce that it has maintained it’s overall rating of Silver for the Teaching Excellence Framework (TEF) 2023 in addition to achieving Gold for student outcomes. 

The TEF is a national scheme run by the Office for Students (OfS) that aims to encourage higher education providers to improve and deliver excellence in the key areas of teaching, learning and achieving positive outcomes for students as a result of their studies. 
 
The exercise, which is repeated every four years, considers evidence provided by the institution, a submission by the student body and several sources of verified, published data to determine the provider’s performance against seven factors. This performance then determines an overall award for the institution: TEF Provisional, TEF Bronze, TEF Silver or TEF Gold. 
 
TEF Silver is awarded where student experience and outcomes are typically very high quality, and there may be some outstanding features. 
 
The TEF panel deemed all features of UCO’s submission to be at least ‘very high quality’ with two areas recognised as ‘outstanding’; resulting in Silver for the Student Experience aspect rating, Gold for the Student Outcomes aspect rating and a rating of Silver overall. 
 
Sharon Potter, Acting Vice-Chancellor says:

“TEF is an important reflection of the high-quality teaching and learning experience we strive to offer all students at the UCO, and we are very pleased to have maintained our status as a TEF Silver institution and to have strengthened our performance in a number of areas. 
 
Our Gold rating for student outcomes is evidence of our commitment to ensuring student success both during and beyond their studies, and we are proud to work collaboratively with our student body to produce graduates who are ready to make positive and impactful contributions to the osteopathic profession and enjoy successful, rewarding careers.”  

The TEF panel’s statement of findings indicates that the UCO has successfully demonstrated high-quality or outstanding performance in the following aspects:  

• uses research, innovation, scholarship, professional practice and/or employer engagement to contribute to an outstanding academic experience for its students; 
• fosters a supportive learning environment and students have access to a readily available range of very high quality academic support; 
• effectively supports its students to achieve its educational gains; 
• outstanding rates of successful progression for the providers students and courses; 
• effectively engages with its students leading to improvements to the experiences and outcomes of its students; 
• the deployment of the tailored approaches is highly effective in supporting its students to succeed in and progress beyond their studies. 

Read the full report on the Office for Students website.