The college's learning centres have been granted a Grade 1 Excellent award – the highest rating possible – for its outstanding support for teaching and learning from the national independent watchdog – the Council for Learning Resources in Colleges – CoLRiC.

The CoLRiC Peer Assessor team, which is made up of senior learning resources specialists from other colleges, said the wide range of Exeter College's learning resources services meet the needs of the users and that the service is an integral part of the college success.

Assessors praised the department headed up by Richard Brine, head of information and learning services and Simon Bowler, learning media services manager describing it as being a 'flexible and responsive service' with 'highly motivated and professional staff.'

The customised Learning Centres across the college were noted as offering a variety of welcoming and attractive areas that are well used and that the college's use of the Learner Voice enabled areas for improvement or development to be identified for example the creation of a 'pop-up centre in response to the need for more learning space.
The integration of information and learning services into all teaching and learning processes was praised, including the 'comprehensive and highly effective programme of induction and bespoke information and research skills programmes'.

“We are delighted that the range of information and learning services we offer across the college has received this national recognition after such a demanding scrutiny,” said Richard Brine. “Exeter College is unusual in combining its learning centres, ICT, web, media and print services into a single department. This benefits learners and staff who are supported by dedicated and professional staff who offer these services in a very joined up way. Our CoLRiC assessors recognised the strength of this integration judging it to be a coherent and effective service and I'm proud that they praised how we identify, design and implement effective services that support and enhance the learner experience in the college. I am also delighted that our motivated and professional staff gained such praise as well as the way that we continue to listen to all our users.”
CoLRiC summary of strengths of the college's information and learning services are:

• Integration of information and learning services into all teaching and learning processes
• The integration of the Learning Centres service with ICT, resulting in a coherent and effective service
• A highly motivated and professional staff
• A coherent approach to creating a cross college self assessment review that focuses on areas for development and therefore addresses these issues; for example the pop-up centre to respond to the need for more learning Centre space
• Customised Learning Centres offering a variety of welcoming and attractive areas that are well used
• The use of the Learner Voice to identify areas for improvement or development; for example the adjustment of student time on network computers
• A flexible and responsive service, listening to all its users
• A comprehensive and highly effective programme of induction and bespoke information and research skills programmes to support teaching and learning; for example the Head of English identified that learners were working at a much higher academic level than they would have been without the input from the service.

The CoLRiC teams have a particular focus on the impact of Learning Centres on curriculum development and reported on strengths and developments in four key areas – leadership and management; resources; integration into teaching and learning and quality assurance – with the overall Grade 1 Excellent award for the college's performance against key criteria in each of the four sections.