University curriculum development – stuck in a process and how to break free.

Changes to governance and funding of universities have placed increasing importance on teaching quality. Curriculum development is central to teaching quality. Yet, as research has shown, it is rarely given priority in university departments. We sought to identify key barriers and facilitators of curriculum development in four professionally accredited master’s level degree programmes within the University of Melbourne, Australia. Our work progresses existing knowledge of curriculum development in three ways: (a) we provide a contemporary assessment of barriers and facilitators, (b) we gauge the views of administrative staff involved in curriculum development and find that they identify important process-oriented means for improvement and (c) we identify the facilitative role professional accreditation plays in curriculum development. A key barrier to curriculum development was found to be the existence of cumbersome, inflexible and lengthy administrative processes. However, we identify means by which these can be addressed, including the revision of long lead times for data provision required by the federal government. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]