HE-D06 — Capstone in University Transformation

Course Code: HE-D06  |  School: School of Higher Education  |  Cluster: Institutional Development

Level: Advanced  |  Estimated duration: 8 weeks (approximately 55 hours)  |  Language: English  |  Certificate: Professional Certificate (non-degree)  |  Format: Self-paced with AI support under human supervision

Overview

This capstone is the terminal course of the School of Higher Education. It does not introduce new content so much as demand that everything already studied be brought to bear on a single real institutional problem, carried from diagnosis to a defended proposal for change. Learners are expected to have completed a substantial portion of the foundation, curriculum, quality, research management and institutional development clusters before beginning.

The work is a consultancy engagement in structure. Each learner selects a real institution, negotiates or specifies a genuine transformation question, gathers evidence, diagnoses the problem across governance, finance, curriculum, quality and culture, and produces a transformation proposal with an implementation sequence, a financial model, a risk register and an evaluation plan. The proposal must be written for a named decision-making body.

Two things are assessed above all others. The first is diagnostic honesty: whether the learner has identified the actual problem rather than the presenting symptom or the politically convenient one. The second is executability: whether the proposal could be implemented by the institution described, with the resources and authority it actually has. A proposal that would require a different institution to implement it fails.

Learning outcomes

On completion, a successful learner will be able to:

1. Negotiate and specify a genuine institutional transformation question with a defined scope and client.
2. Design and execute an evidence-gathering strategy combining documentary, quantitative and interview sources.
3. Diagnose an institutional problem across governance, finance, curriculum, quality and cultural dimensions simultaneously.
4. Synthesise evidence into a defensible diagnosis that distinguishes root cause from presenting symptom.
5. Construct a transformation proposal with sequenced implementation, financial model, risk register and evaluation plan.
6. Write and present for a senior institutional audience and defend the proposal under sustained questioning.
7. Reflect critically on the limits of the analysis and on the learner’s own position and bias within it.

Who this course is for

Learners completing the School of Higher Education programme, senior and aspiring institutional leaders, and consultants seeking a rigorous framework for university transformation work. Access to a real institution, as employee or negotiated client, is required.

Prerequisites

Completion of HE-D02 University Strategy and Leadership, HE-D04 University Governance and Finance and HE-D05 Institutional Change Management, together with at least four other courses in the School. Access to a real institution and its documentation is mandatory.

Syllabus

Module 1 — Scoping the Engagement

A badly scoped question produces a competent answer to the wrong problem. This module negotiates scope explicitly and records what has been excluded and by whom.

Lessons. 1.1 Selecting an institution and negotiating access  ·  1.2 Framing the transformation question with the client  ·  1.3 Scope, exclusions and the politics of what may be examined  ·  1.4 Engagement ethics, confidentiality and independence

Deliverable. A diagnostic note comprising a signed or specified terms of reference with question, scope, exclusions, access and ethical arrangements.

Module 2 — Evidence Strategy and Collection

The evidence base determines the credibility of everything that follows, and it must be planned before it is gathered. The module builds and executes the plan.

Lessons. 2.1 Documentary evidence: strategy, accounts, minutes, review reports  ·  2.2 Quantitative evidence: student, staff, financial and performance data  ·  2.3 Interview and observation: sampling, protocol and confidentiality  ·  2.4 Triangulation and the deliberate search for disconfirming evidence

Deliverable. An analytical brief comprising an evidence collection plan with instruments, sampling and a completed first tranche of collection.

Module 3 — Multi-Dimensional Diagnosis

Institutional problems rarely sit within one function, and single-function diagnoses produce recommendations that fail elsewhere. This module diagnoses across five dimensions at once.

Lessons. 3.1 Governance and authority diagnosis  ·  3.2 Financial and resource diagnosis  ·  3.3 Curriculum, quality and academic diagnosis  ·  3.4 Cultural diagnosis and the identification of root cause

Deliverable. A design artefact: a five-dimension diagnostic report distinguishing presenting symptoms from root causes, with evidence for each finding.

Module 4 — Designing the Transformation

The proposal must specify what will change, who will do it, what it will cost and what will be given up. This module builds it with that discipline.

Lessons. 4.1 Options generation and the rejection of alternatives  ·  4.2 Sequencing by dependency, capacity and political feasibility  ·  4.3 Financial modelling and resource reallocation  ·  4.4 Trade-offs and what the institution will stop doing

Deliverable. An evaluation report presenting the transformation options considered, the option selected, and a full justification of the rejections.

Module 5 — Risk, Evaluation and the Written Proposal

A transformation proposal without a risk register and an evaluation plan is an expression of hope. The module completes both and drafts the document for its actual audience.

Lessons. 5.1 Risk identification, rating and mitigation ownership  ·  5.2 Evaluation design: measures, baselines and review points  ·  5.3 Writing for a governing body or executive team  ·  5.4 Draft review and structured peer critique

Deliverable. An implementation plan comprising a full risk register, evaluation design and a complete draft of the transformation proposal.

Module 6 — Defence and Reflection

The proposal is defended orally before an assessor and peers, under questioning designed to find its weakest assumption. Reflection on the learner’s own position within the analysis is required and marked.

Lessons. 6.1 Preparing the defence and anticipating the hardest question  ·  6.2 Presenting to a senior audience  ·  6.3 Responding to challenge without defensiveness  ·  6.4 Reflecting on positionality, access limits and analytical bias

Deliverable. A 6,000–8,000-word transformation proposal with executive summary, evidence base, five-dimension diagnosis, option analysis, sequenced implementation plan, financial model, risk register and evaluation design, defended in a live viva and accompanied by a 1,500-word reflective statement.

Assessment

Pass mark 70 per cent. All assessed components must be attempted. Every mark in this course is issued by a human assessor; no assessment outcome is generated automatically.

Rubric criteria

Each assessed artefact is marked against four criteria at four levels (distinction, pass with merit, pass, fail).

1. Diagnostic honesty. The root cause is identified with evidence and distinguished from the presenting or politically convenient problem.
2. Evidential strength. Findings rest on triangulated evidence and disconfirming evidence has been sought and reported.
3. Executability. The proposal could be implemented by the institution as it is, with the authority and resources it actually holds.
4. Defence and reflexivity. The proposal withstands sustained questioning and the learner accounts candidly for their own position and the analysis’s limits.

Reading list

Core. Shattock, M. (2006) Managing Good Governance in Higher Education. Maidenhead: Open University Press.

• Kezar, A. (2018) How Colleges Change: Understanding, Leading, and Enacting Change, 2nd edn. New York: Routledge.
• Birnbaum, R. (1988) How Colleges Work: The Cybernetics of Academic Organization and Leadership. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
• Rumelt, R. (2011) Good Strategy/Bad Strategy: The Difference and Why It Matters. New York: Crown Business.
• Clark, B. R. (1998) Creating Entrepreneurial Universities: Organizational Pathways of Transformation. Oxford: Pergamon and IAU Press.
• Yin, R. K. (2018) Case Study Research and Applications: Design and Methods, 6th edn. Thousand Oaks: Sage.

Academic integrity and use of AI

Generative AI may be used in this course as a drafting, translation and critique aid, and its use must be disclosed. Every submission carries a short use-of-AI statement naming the tools used, the tasks they performed and the checks the learner applied to the output. Using AI to fabricate data, invent sources, impersonate an interview participant, or produce an artefact the learner cannot explain in a live viva is prohibited.

All citations are verified before submission; a reference that cannot be located by the assessor is treated as fabricated. Fabrication, plagiarism and undisclosed ghost-authorship result in failure of the component and referral to the academic integrity panel. Marks in this course are issued by human assessors, and any learner may be asked to defend a submission orally before a mark is confirmed.