Movements towards a European dimension in Quality Assurance and Accreditation Don F. Westerheijden Conference Working on the European Dimension of Quality.

Movements towards a European dimension in Movements towards a European dimension in Quality Assurance and AccreditationQuality Assurance and Accreditation

Don F. Westerheijden

Conference Working on the European Dimension of Quality

Amsterdam, 12-13.3.2002

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ContentsContents

1 The Context: the Globalisation Challenge2 The European Response: the Bologna Declaration

Intermezzi3 National Responses4 International initiatives

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11 The Globalisation Challenge:The Globalisation Challenge:The WTO AgendaThe WTO Agenda

• GATS: General Agreement on Trades and Services• Is education a service? Yes, but…

– Education has a public good character at least up to secondary education

– Private benefits outweigh public benefits for postgraduate ‘job training‘

• Is higher education the borderline?– Europe: higher education is a public good

• thinking of undergraduate higher education (‘initial’ higher education)

– USA: post-initial higher education is a service

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11 The Globalisation Challenge:The Globalisation Challenge:The WTO Agenda The WTO Agenda

• How to maintain the border between initial and post-initial?– it depends on the situation of the student

• US proposal applies only to countries where private higher education is allowed

• If a higher education provider is allowed into one EU country, it is automatically allowed to operate in all EU countries?

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11 The Globalisation Challenge:The Globalisation Challenge:Who are the Actors?Who are the Actors?

• WTO is inter-governmental• For a governmental task: regulate markets• Actors on the higher education market are

– higher education institutions– virtual/online universities– corporate universities– and their hybrids

• Actors decide autonomously to be ‘global players’ or not

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22 The Bologna Declaration, 1999The Bologna Declaration, 1999

• Two main rationales for Bologna: – Make European higher education competitive again

in world market– Simplify mobility within Europe:

for labour market, for students

• Main mechanism: ‘bachelor’-‘master’-‘doctor’ model– governmental reform of (public?) higher education– public higher education institutions are instruments of

government policy, not autonomous actors

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22 The Bologna Declaration, 1999The Bologna Declaration, 1999

• Striving for ‘comparable degrees’– ‘Similar degrees’, or ‘degrees that can be compared’?– Anyway, transparency is needed

• Role for quality assurance in Bologna process is to provide transparency

• but Bologna is vague about quality assurance – ‘Promotion of European co-operation in quality assurance

with a view to develop comparable criteria and methodologies’

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22 Follow-Up Conference: Prague, May 2001Follow-Up Conference: Prague, May 2001

• No big changes from Bologna:• ‘higher education is perceived as a public good and

governments are the agents in society that are responsible for providing public goods’

• ‘Ministers called upon the universities and other higher educations institutions, national agencies and the European Network of Quality Assurance in Higher Education (ENQA) … to collaborate in establishing a common framework of reference and to disseminate best practice’

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Intermezzo 1: Some Design Requirements Intermezzo 1: Some Design Requirements for Q.A. After Bologna and WTOfor Q.A. After Bologna and WTO

• Bologna:– Object of evaluation: (comparable) degrees – Consumer protection against substandard programmes – Europe-wide transparency

• WTO: – Fair competition

• national - foreign• public - private

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Intermezzo 2: Some Dilemmas in AccreditationIntermezzo 2: Some Dilemmas in Accreditation

• For many, programme accreditation is the answer to the Bologna design requirements– focus on degrees (programmes)– more transparency, compared with (formative) quality

assessment– consumer protection, through minimum standards

• Dilemma: quality assessment without real consequences is not taken seriously, quality assessment with real consequences turns into a strategic game without regard for quality of education.

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Intermezzo 2: Some Dilemmas in AccreditationIntermezzo 2: Some Dilemmas in Accreditation

• Dynamics of external evaluation change:– role of higher education institution:

self-evaluation vs. self-selling– role of external reviewers:

peers/consultants vs. experts/judges

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Intermezzo 3: How Might the European Intermezzo 3: How Might the European Higher Education Area Work?Higher Education Area Work?

secondary education

“bachelor”

“master”

professional orientation

“master”,

research oriented

professional doctorates

Ph.D.

Life-long learning Labour market

Initial H.E.

Local and

Regional

Inter-national

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3 National Responses3 National Responses

• Bachelor/Master structural reforms– in many countries

e.g. Germany, Italy, Netherlands– not where two-cycle structure already existed

e.g. UK, France– not (so much) where two-level structures already existed

e.g. Central/Eastern Europe – but this is not our topic in this conference

• Regulation of transnational education export– UK

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3 National Responses 3 National Responses

• Changes to evaluation, quality assessment, accreditation – Germany: Akkreditierungsrat

• ‘open accreditation system’• programme accreditation

– Netherlands: National Accreditation Organ• like Germany

– Switzerland: Organisation for Accreditation and Quality • institutional accreditation

– Flanders: too small for own accreditation?

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3 National Responses: Potential Problems3 National Responses: Potential Problems

• Do national responses lead to more European harmonisation?– Or will only the differences stand out more clearly?– One’s judgement depends on interpretation of ‘comparable’

• Will national accreditation lead to less diversity within countries?– While it is claimed that diversity is needed in the ‘knowledge

society’…– Should not be the case in an ‘open accreditation system’

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4 International Initiatives: World-wide4 International Initiatives: World-wide

• IQR: internationalisation quality review• GATE: Global Alliance for Transnational Education

– changed character dramatically in 1998: online, for-profit only

• ‘Global Quality Label’– INQAAHE: Internatl. Network Q.A. Agencies – IAUP: Internatl. Assoc. University Presidents– UNESCO– a label for quality agencies

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4 International Initiatives: Platforms4 International Initiatives: Platforms

H.E. Providers

Q.A. Agency

Government

Customers:Students

Customers:Employers, Professions

IAUP

INQAAHE

UNESCO

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4 International Initiatives: World-wide4 International Initiatives: World-wide

• Let us not forget private initiatives:– professional bodies: EFMD’s EQUIS– university associations: EUA Institutional Evaluation

Programme – university consortia: Universitas 21, CEMS, ECIU – GATE post-1998

• Are the Americans coming?– More demand from universities than willingness of US

accreditors to expand business?

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4 International Initiatives: European4 International Initiatives: European

• ENQA / EUA / ESIB– talking about several projects

• a.o. setting up a European platform

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4 International Initiatives: Platforms4 International Initiatives: Platforms

H.E. Providers

Q.A. Agency

Government

Customers:Students

IAUP

INQAAHE

UNESCO

EUA

ENQA

ESIB

Customers:Employers, Professions

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4 International Initiatives: European4 International Initiatives: European

• ENQA: Membership rules as quality ‘screening’?

• Cross-border evaluation pilot projects – a series of them, started in ca. 1991

• Tuning Project (Socrates)• Joint Quality Initiative

• ENQA / EUA / ESIB– talking about several projects

• a.o. setting up a European platform

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Thank you for your attention