FAQ

Policy development at La Trobe is governed by the La Trobe University Policy on Policies which provides direction on:

• How policies are developed;
• Who is responsible for approving policies; and
• How policies are amended, edited or revoked.

La Trobe Policies fall into two categories

1. Academic Policies relating to courses, awards and assessment, quality assurance, student engagement, wellbeing and integrity.
2. Administrative Policies relating to risk management, human resources, finance, information communication technology and student administration.

Academic policies and procedures are approved by Academic Board.

Administrative policies and procedures are approved by the Vice-Chancellor on the recommendation of the Senior Executive Group.

Council approve matters of governance and compliance that cannot be delegated. These include Policies and Procedures that deal with any significant strategic, financial or reputational risks attached.

The Policy Library is a Policy Development and Management System that has been designed to provide easy access to policy documents for students, staff and other stakeholders. The Policy Library is the sole authoritative source of official academic and administrative policies and procedures of the University.

The system also has workflow functionality which provides policy authors and approvers with a suite of tools and automated processes to assist in policy development, review, consultation and approval.

The Policy Library provides access to University-wide policies and procedures and other relevant information including:

• associated information and reference material including forms, legislation and flowcharts
• information about recent amendments and changes to documents
• document author and ownership details
• document review dates
• glossary of terms
• access to draft documents so that feedback can be provided in a coordinated way

All La Trobe policies and procedures are listed in the A-Z page in alphabetical order, by title. You can also search the Policy Library via the Search page using:

• Full text – search for one word, multiple words or tick ‘Match Exact Phrase’ check box.
• Keyword - search for a keyword in the document title, summary or keywords
• Academic or Administrative – limit the search to academic or administrative documents
• Management Area – lists documents by Division, Unit and title
• Document Category – lists documents together in themed groups e.g all policy documents
• Target Audience – limits search to documents that relate to a specific group e.g students
• Policy Reference Number – search by document reference number

Documents in the Policy Library have associated information which may include links and references to related information and materials such as relevant legislation, other policies and procedures, forms, web pages. You can access the ‘Associated Information’ page from the current version of the policy document, the link is in the grey menu bar.

Policies and procedures that are in draft or under review are posted to the Bulletin Board. You can provide feedback on any document posted for comment on the Bulletin Board by clicking on the document title and following the prompts. Your comments will be sent through to the author for consideration.

If a Policy or Procedure is not under review, you can provide feedback directly to the author or Unit Head. We suggest that you contact the enquiries email or phone number in the first instance. To do this – open the current version of the document and go to the ‘Status and Details’ page (a link to this page is in the grey menu bar). There you will find the name of the author, the relevant Unit Head and a general enquiries contact. Click on the name of any these and an email page will open, allowing you to insert and forward your feedback. Please ensure that you provide clear details about the particular document you are providing feedback on and sufficient information to relate your comments to the relevant part of the document e.g section 3, clause 11.

To print a policy, procedure, guideline from the Policy Library, simple click the Printable Version (PDF) web link on the right-hand side of the information section at the bottom of the webpage. The document will open as a PDF and you can either print or save the document. You can also use the print icon in your internet browser banner at the top right-hand side of the page.

Different web browsers can display parts of the Policy Library differently. The Policy Library has been tested with the following browsers:

• Microsoft Internet Explorer Version 7 and later
• Apple Safari Version 5 and later
• Mozilla Firefox Version 4 and later
• Google Chrome

We recommend using Firefox or Chrome as a browser when you are an author creating a document in the system.

If you would like to access a former (or historic) version of a policy or procedure, you can by clicking on the current version of the document and then use the ‘Historic Versions’ link in the light grey document menu bar. A listing of historic versions will appear on this page in chronological order. If you are looking for a version of the document that was in place prior to the implementation of the online Policy Library (December 2016), please contact the Assurance Group via policy@latrobe.edu.au

Contact Assurance Group via policy@latrobe.edu.au

The Bulletin Board within the Policy Library lists policies and procedures that have recently changed.

No – most of the University’s policies and procedures are available. There may be some documents that are restricted to staff only, in this case you will need to login with your La Trobe University username and active directory password to access these documents.

If you an author or approver, you will need to login to the system with your La Trobe University username and active directory password to create, edit and/or approve documents.

You may also require a password to login to some documents on the Bulletin Board if they are in the early stages of development. The author of the documents will set up the password to access these documents.