I am totally with you, Sandy. More common-sense and less misogyny would make a lot of difference. Currently economics starts by telling you that everything you thought you knew about people caring for each other and collaborating is untrue as the ‘truth’ is that everyone is selfish! It effectively disempowers people by invalidating their common sense.

While this suggestion for how to inject pluralism into economics may seem absolutely outlandish, please be assured that it worked for over 100 years in the U.S. after it was mandated by Congress in 1862. The courses were discontinued in the 1980s to make room for tech education. So, as a result, many of the people currently working to change the whole market-driven nature of economics have never heard of it. It was called HOME Economics. That did not mean “stir & stitch”, it meant teaching all people how to remain financially solvent for an entire lifetime — common, ordinary, everyday economics. Without it, you have the world we have today. If Economics could dain to look below themselves, into what is now called Human Ecology, K-14, and get behind teaching every kid that every aspect of life has an economic impact, micro and macro, then you could achieve true pluralism. Homes produce human capital. Without crafting families to understand inter-related personal economics, they cannot produce human capital. If Economics could advantage itself of more common-sense and less misogyny, there would be hope for us all!

Q2.
3rd bullet: We have to be a bit careful if the peer reviewers make suggestions for improvement and then effectively approve the improvements they’ve recommended. So additional peer reviewers may need adding at that stage, or it could be that such instances have to be discussed by the accreditation board (final assessment board) to ensure impartiality.
Suggest replacing ‘compliance’ in 5th bullet with ‘ assessment’ and swopping it with the 4th bullet.
Maybe add as an additional principle: Accreditation will take a risk-based approach, ie less issues and closer compliance will result in less frequent and/or less intensive assessment, and vice versa.

Q3.
3rd bullet: not so sure about recruitment strategies but others OK.
5th bullet: ‘lectures’ should presumably be ‘lecturers’.
6th bullet: ‘assessment processes’ presumably means grading criteria and quality control – better to say this more clearly so it’s not confused with this scheme’s assessment processes.
Suggest adding another bullet: Details of the complaints procedure (eg feedback from students) and how. these are handled.

Q4.
I think this is the place to introduce on-site visits. I would suggest something along the lines of:
‘An on-site visit will generally take place within the first year of accreditation, and subsequently at least once every (say) three years. However, following a risk-based approach, the assessment panel may consider it necessary to increase their frequency.’ I say ‘generally’ as it may be obviously unnecessary and in which case can be delayed.

Q5.
All looks sensible, but I think there also needs to be mention of an appeals process, to allow recourse in the, hopefully unlikely, event of a disputed decision.
‘Heads of department’ should be the ‘responsible person’ identified in the application.

Congratulations for the project!

Question 2 (Principles):
Fully agree with these principles, not least because they reflect a proportionate risk based approach where trust, shared values and purpose are essential.

Question 3 (Evidence):
These all seem potentially relevant types of evidence but perhaps you should not suggest that all are necessary or equally important, perhaps by replacing ‘Such documentation would be expected to include…’ with ‘Such documentation might include…’

Question 4 (Adequacy):
This seems a good starting point – no doubt it will become apparent in the pilot process whether more checks needed to be added

Question 5 (Reporting):
I like this approach – especially opportunity for students to be involved in the review and improvement of the process.

Question 6 (Ongoing development):
I strongly agree there needs to be a multi-stakeholder collective learning and development process, but I will leave it to others better qualified than me to comment on what this process might be.

You have not as yet justified the need for a pluralist approach.

I would tend to take out “that are resented by participants as a necessary evil from an external ignorant and misguided (at best) organisation”

Question 2 Do you agree with these principles? Are any missing?
“The assessment should be very much a peer to peer process” which we aim to make supportive, rather than proscriptive.
Other than that, fine.

Question 3 Are these types of evidence reasonable? Should we be expecting any others?”
“Departmental policies, professional development and recruitment strategies;” this sounds rather prescriptive. I can that recruitment will make a difference – if neo-growthists are employed, for example, but all the same, I doubt institutions will be much interested in giving away much information on this.

“Details of lectures on the course the qualifications and experience that ensure a pluralist approach; and” Again, this seems a bit much and might make accreditation dependent on particular staff rather than the department as a whole.

It is the curricula, learning and assessment plans that are important.

Question 4 Will this be adequate to make an assessment of the programme?
I assume that all documentation will also be received.

Question 5 What do you think of this approach? Any other compliance procedures we might consider?
This seems fine.

Question 6 How do you think this could best work? Can you suggest models we could learn from? Would a mechanism to share teaching material be useful? How might it work?
TBH, I am not sure how this will work with staff who might not actually have enough time to deliver their units as it is. However, it would make sense to allow staff access to pluralist materials. Perhaps a programme of visiting lecturers might be useful – again, however, it will depend on the time commitment of the staff involved.

Collective learning and development. I agree with the approach. we might also set up a site to list conferences, seminars, publications with pluralist content/approaches