APRC review cycle

During the Michaelmas term, each Head of Department/Institute is required to attend Annual Monitoring meetings with the Director and Pro-Directors. These meetings provide an opportunity to discuss progress towards objectives identified in the department’s latest development plan and any revisions to those objectives, as well as addressing issues arising from the RAM indicators. The outcomes of these discussions will be reported to the APRC. If progress is satisfactory, proposals for development are supported and the RAM indicators are favourable over the planning period, the APRC may release any additional resources associated with proposed activities. If progress is not on target then the Directorate will alert the APRC to any contributing issues. Prolonged or dramatic deviation from agreed objectives and targets may result in the APRC endorsing claw-back of resources. The outcome of the Annual Monitoring exercise will influence whether or not a department/institute will be subject to a full or light-touch APRC review.

The APRC undertakes reviews of all academic and service units within the School. Departments making satisfactory progress towards the objectives identified in their development plan and agreed by the APRC will be allowed to undergo a light-touch review. Those departments deviating from agreed targets will be subject to a full review. Departments may request a full review regardless of progress and similarly the APRC may request a full review of a department deemed to be progressing satisfactorily. As with the Annual Monitoring exercise, the main purpose of the APRC reviews is to establish the level of resource necessary to enable a unit to maintain its core functions and realise its medium-term plans. However, the reviews also have a wider role in ensuring the congruence of a department's medium term plans with those of the School and the pursuit of equity (a notion of achievable fairness having regard to all relevant criteria) within and across the School.

All APRC reviews were suspended for the 2007/8 session. From 2008/9 it is anticipated that academic departments will be reviewed during a two year period, with non-academic departments being reviewed in the following two years and then a year with no reviews. Therefore an academic department reviewed in 2008/9 is likely to undergo Annual Monitoring until their next review year in 2013/14.

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