LJMU has become the first post-92 university to be awarded the Mark of Excellence from the Association of University Administrators. This tremendous achievement was two years in the making and the result of hard work by the Leadership and Development Foundation team.

The Mark of Excellence is awarded to Higher Education Institutions that demonstrate their commitment to working with the AUA professional values and can evidence how they have embedded the AUA CPD Framework into their professional staff development provision.

Meriel Box, Head, Leadership and Development Foundation at LJMU, commented:

 “We are proud to be the first post 92 university to achieve the full award. We are raising the professionalism of staff through engagement with the AUA professional body and the CPD Framework. We explicitly mapped our LJMU Values to the AUA professional behaviours to embed these in our high performance culture.”

LJMU successfully submitted for full institutional recognition.

The LJMU Team

Gary Graham, Deputy Chief Executive, Organisational Enhancement at LJMU, commented:

 “This is a great achievement and testament to our ‘One University’ philosophy which was central to the application.”

Furthermore, LJMU received a series of commendations for good practice on their excellent performance from John Ryan MBE, Programme Lead of the AUA Mark of Excellence. These commendations mentioned the high level of commitment to use the Framework long term, the prominence afforded to staff to achieve professional accreditation through he AUA, the use of the CPD framework alongside coaching and mentoring guidelines and the innovative game based materials designed by the Leadership and Development Foundation team to implement for small group work.

Amanda Oliver, Director of College Operations, Brunel University and Chair of the AUA Mark of Excellence Assessment Panel, commented,

“The application from LJMU for the AUA Mark of Excellence was very strong. It provided a breadth of evidence to demonstrate the university’s’ commitment to developing its staff, and in particular in embedding the AUA CPD framework in to processes which support this. Overall the Mark of Excellence panel was very impressed with the application and this was recognised in a number of commendations. LJMU have introduced a number of initiatives in preparation for submitting their application which are innovative and demonstrate excellent practice across the sector. Many congratulations to LJMU; the Mark of Excellence is thoroughly deserved.”