Summary of the Self-assessment report

The SAR of the Faculty of History (FH) on the Bachelor of Arts in History Programme (BAHP) under AUN-QA was highly evaluated by the QA teams from the USSH and VNUHCM in 2014. Since then self-assessment has been an important step in the programme quality assurance, matching development needs and innovations in education and training. This urges the FH to carry out it. The results of SAR under the AUN-QA also help the FH gain valuable experiences and ideas in promoting its strengths and reducing weaknesses of the BAHP. Implementing the USSH’s registration of QA at programme and faculty levels in 2020, the Faculty makes an official SAR on the BAHP under the AUN-QA.

This SAR (under AUN-QA criteria) concentrates on the description, analysis and self-assessment of the BAHP, a full-time programme in five years from 2020 backwards. Almost all the FH staff and administrators have participated in the SAR. The Faculty focused on studying, understanding and applying the AUN criteria, and formed eight groups to build a database, collect evidence, write the report and translate it so that its SAR could be completed.

The SAR has three main objectives: (1) to describe the key factors which the FH has built and developed in the long run to match a programme in accordance with AUN-QA standards, (2) to identify the FH’s strengths and weaknesses to have a foundation for activities in development, improvement and enhancement of the programme quality, and (3) to create a premise to continue the revision of direction and development strategies towards deep integration into the region and the world.

The SAR consists of 4 main parts: (1) a brief introduction to the FH, (2) a self-assessment of the BAHP under the AUN-QA, (3) a summary of strengths and weaknesses and outlines of the proposed improvement and/or relevant plan, and (4) appendices as exhibitions for the analysis and self-assessment.

Among its strengths, the BAHP is considered as one of the programmes that can basically meet all aspects of the AUN-QA. In particular, it is always updated with the modern trend so as to be suitable and capable of meeting social needs that are changing and affected by various factors. The BAHP is not only well-constructed by a team of highly trained and specialised lecturers with solid experience but also combines the experienced and dynamic young ones - all with strong pedagogy toward learner-centred. Although the quality of student input is average, the output is good, which helps meet most social needs of human resource. This is also an outstanding strength of the BAHP.

Some of the weaknesses are related to current difficulties of the University and may also come from Vietnam’s economy and society. Funding for academic activities, working conditions, salary payment and remuneration for lecturers are sometimes not reasonable, which may not meet all the requirements of the AUN-QA criteria. This is also one of the long-term and tough problems of the FH in the innovation process. Those difficulties all hinder the development and implementation of strategies to improve the FH’s expertise.

The AUN accreditation of the FH is a good condition to receive external assessments and comments from which it can review the quality of the BAHP and have a development orientation and better improvement. This also helps its integration and comparison with other faculties of the same (or similar) discipline in ASEAN.

Source: FACULTY OF HISTORY

Reviser: PhD.Anh Thư