An Integrated Decision Support Model For Enhancing Continuous Improvement Of Academic Programs

Abstract

Continuous Quality Improvement (CQI) in higher educational institutions is considered an aspect that plays a vital role in maintaining excellence in teaching and learning. It focuses on several critical phases such as designing Program Learning Outcomes (PLOs) assessment plans, collecting data, evaluating the of PLO achievement results, and designing and implementing improvement actions to achieve educational goals. CQI is very critical to assess and improve the educational process. As it appears, academic program decision-makers find difficult to formulate and implement an authentic CQI for their programs without the help of decision support systems (DSSs). Therefore, this paper proposes an integrated decision support model that provides CQI decision support to enhance academic programs. Moreover, it provides authentication of the CQI process by auto-checking the accuracy of the CQI phases (assessment, evaluation, designing, and implementing improvement). After the development and implementation of the proposed model in a bachelor-level academic institution, the results show that the proposed model provides decision support for enhancing academic program’s CQI, and authentication of the CQI accuracy, which will lead to the improvement of the educational process and the achievement of educational goals.