Quality and standards in English higher education
Teaching excellence
The Teaching Excellence Framework (TEF) assesses and rates universities and colleges for excellence above our minimum requirements for quality and standards.
Our regulations state that registered higher education providers must participate in the TEF if they have at least 500 undergraduate students.
There are three ratings categories:
- Gold: The student experience and student outcomes are typically outstanding.
- Silver: The student experience and student outcomes are typically very high quality.
- Bronze: The student experience and student outcomes are typically high quality, and there are some very high quality features.
You can browse TEF ratings, which includes a summary for each provider setting out the panel's reasoning for their rating, and explore provider and student submission documents in more detail.
What does outstanding look like?
Our guidance on the TEF provides a breakdown of features of a provider’s provision that could be identified as outstanding (TEF Gold).
- The provider has embedded outstanding teaching, feedback and assessment practices that are highly effective and tailored to supporting its students' learning, progression, and attainment.
- Course content and delivery inspire the provider’s students to actively engage in and commit to their learning, and stretch students to develop knowledge and skills to their fullest potential.
- The provider uses research in relevant disciplines, innovation, scholarship, professional practice and/or employer engagement to contribute to an outstanding academic experience for its students.
- There is outstanding support for staff professional development and excellent academic practice is embedded across the provider.
- The provider ensures a supportive learning environment, and its students have access to a wide and readily available range of outstanding quality academic support tailored to their needs.
- Physical and virtual learning resources are tailored and used effectively to support outstanding teaching and learning.
- The provider embeds engagement with its students, leading to continuous improvement to the experiences and outcomes of its students.
- The provider deploys and tailors approaches that are highly effective in ensuring its students succeed in and progress beyond their studies.
- There are outstanding rates of continuation and completion for the provider’s students and courses.
- There are outstanding rates of successful progression for the provider’s students and courses.
- The provider clearly articulates the range educational gains it intends its students to achieve, and why these are highly relevant to its students and their future ambitions.
- The provider’s approaches to supporting its students to achieve these gains are evidence-based, highly effective and tailored to its students and their different starting points.
- The provider evaluates the gains made by its students, and demonstrates its students are succeeding in achieving the intended gains
TEF case studies
We have developed case studies to share examples of initiatives or approaches that the TEF panel found to be excellent:
- Supporting students to achieve their ‘Personal Best’
- Empowering staff through values-driven development
- Taking a holistic approach to peer-led learning
- Outstanding student-centred, individualised support for college higher education students
- Co-creation to improve student engagement and outcomes
- Equipping graduates for a rapidly changing creative industry
Find out more
For more details, see 'condition B6: Teaching Excellence Framework participation' of our conditions of registration with the OfS.
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