The AILG Peer Visit Program Committee will be conducting pilot visits (virtual) in Spring 2022.
This program is a successor to the AILG Accreditation Program, which began operation in 2007. In 2019, the AILG board decided that the Accreditation process itself needed some review. An Accreditation Review Group was formed and we set out to rethink and redesign the program to respond to today’s times and challenges.Now we are pleased to present the new Peer Visit Program.
“What’s new and different?” you ask.
What’s out?
No more Basic Data Form (BDF). This form was too long and detailed for the new Peer Visit focus. We decided that a shorter and more open-ended set of questions would serve better as a basis for peer visit conversation.
No more Accreditation. No longer will we “recommend”, “recommend with reservations”, or “not recommend” that an organization be accredited. This is no longer a necessary role for the program.
What’s still in?
Alum Leadership. We will still have teams of alum volunteers who visit each of the FSILGs and meet with the alum and undergraduate leadership. They will write a summary of their visit. The FSILG may edit the summary before it is forwarded to the AILG Peer Review Committee and the FSILG Office.
What’s new?
Focus on Support. The new program will be focused on Peer Support, particularly support for the alum organizations of each FSILG. In advance of the visit, each FSILG will fill out a short Peer Visit Questionnaire, which will help frame the discussion during the visit. Organizations are encouraged to set some goals and the Peer Visit Teams will offer assistance if they can. Assistance might come in the form of referrals to various alum peers, MIT, AILG, IRDF, or FCI resources, or it might come in the form of discussion of best practices that an organization can consider adopting.
What’s next?
The goal of this program is ultimately to visit each FSILG annually, to understand best practices and to identify challenges and goals. PVP is intended to be a support process, not an evaluation process. To get rolling, a small number of FSILGs have volunteered to host pilot reviews late in the Fall term. These will be followed with a much fuller complement of FSILG visits in the Spring term.
Reviews will be entirely virtual until further notice, and we anticipate that the review discussions will be approximately 90 minutes over Zoom, scheduled at the convenience of the participants. The reviewer team will be three alumni volunteers. From the host chapter, we request three alumni officers (house corporation/advisory board) and three undergraduate officers.
This is what is requestrd from volunteer reviewers:
- Participate in a short Zoom discussion summarizing the goals and process for the new program.
- Join at least one review team (3 alums to review each FSILG)
- The leader of each review team should contact the FSILG to be reviewed and set a mutually convenient time for the review discussion
- Conduct the review (approx. 90 minute Zoom meeting) using the PVP Questionnaire as a guide
- Summarize the conversation
- Especially for the pilot reviews, provide feedback to the PVP committee about the process
We hope that the flexibility of scheduling and the virtual format will make it easier for both volunteer reviewers and FSILG hosts to participate, and we look forward to your feedback.
If you would like to volunteer as a reviewer, or advocate for your FSILG to participate earlier in the schedule, or simply want more information, please contact either of the Committee Co-Chairs Roy Russell and Mary Linton Peters: roy@alum.mit.edu and mlbt@alum.mit.edu. The committee email is ailg-pvp@mit.edu.