The European standards and guidelines for quality assurance

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The European standards and guidelines for quality
assurance

• Séamus Puirséil,
• Vice President, ENQA

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From the 2003 Berlin communiqué

• At the European level, Ministers call upon ENQA
  through its members, in co-operation with the
  EUA, EURASHE and ESIB, to develop an agreed set
  of standards, procedures and guidelines on
  quality assurance to explore ways of ensuring an
  adequate peer review system for quality assurance
  and / or accreditation agencies or bodies, and to
  report back through the Follow up Group of
  Ministers in 2005

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The 2005 ENQA report to Bergen

• European Standards and Guidelines for quality
• assurance in higher education
• 5-yearly reviews of European quality assurance
  
• agencies
• Register of quality assurance agencies
• European Consultative Forum for Quality Assurance

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Some principles to start with .

• There is no globally agreed definition of quality
  in higher education
• No discussion of policy or practice concerning
  quality assurance should be started without an
  explicit and clear contextual definition of the
  use of the word quality
• Quality can only be assured by those responsible
  for providing higher education
• Quality frequently includes standards but
  these are different things

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A problem

• Quality assurance in higher education does not
  have a single purpose, a single method, or a
  single operational definition
• It can, and does, mean many different things in
  different contexts

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A diversity of purposes for quality assurance

• Accountability
• Control
• Improvement / enhancement
• Public information
• Public reassurance / confidence
• International acceptability
• Ranking
• Resource allocation

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A diversity of quality assurance models

• Programme/subject evaluation
• Programme/subject accreditation
• Programme/subject assessment
• Programme/subject review
• Institutional evaluation
• Institutional audit
• Institutional review
• Institutional accreditation

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A diversity of methods

• Peer Review
• Inspection
• Connoisseur judgements
• Criterion (or standards) based judgements
• Compliance models
• Quantitative models
• Self-regulatory models
• Threshold models
• Excellence models
• Hybrid Models

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A diversity of outcomes

• Public and private information reports
• Recommendations
• Confidence judgements
• Approvals
• Accreditation decisions
• Rankings

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Six quality assurance questions

• what are you trying to do?
• why are you doing it?
• how are you going to do it?
• why will that be the best way to do it?
• how will you know it works?
• how will be able to improve it?

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• Process follows purpose

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European Standards and Guidelines (ESG) 2005

• 3 parts
• Internal quality assurance
• External quality assurance
• Peer Review of quality assurance agencies
• www.enqa.net/files/ENQA20Bergen20Report.pdf3

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Objectives of the ESG

• To encourage the development of higher education
  institutions which foster vibrant intellectual
  and educational achievement
• To provide a source of assistance and guidance to
  higher education institutions and other relevant
  agencies in developing their own culture of
  quality assurance
• To inform and raise the expectations of higher
  education institutions, students, employers and
  other stakeholders about the processes and
  outcomes of higher education
• To contribute to a common frame of reference for
  the provision of higher education and the
  assurance of quality within the EHEA.

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What the ESG offer

• Generic, not specific, standards and guidelines
• A view of what should be done, not how it should
  be done
• A source of assistance and guidance

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What the ESG are NOT

• Prescriptive
• Detailed Procedures
• A European quality assurance system

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• Quality Assurance in Higher Education does not
  have a single purpose, a single method, or a
  single operational definition
• It can, and does, mean many different things in
  different contexts

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ESG Part 1 Internal Quality Assurance

• 1.1 Policy and procedures for quality assurance
• 1.2 Approval, monitoring and periodic review of
• programmes and awards
• 1.3 Assessment of students
• 1.4 Quality assurance of teaching staff
• 1.5 Information systems
• 1.6 Public Information

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ESG Part 2 external quality assurance

• 2.1Use of internal quality assurance procedures
• 2.2 Development of exernal quality assurance
  processes
• 2.3 Criteria for decisions
• 2.4 Processes fit for purpose
• 2.5 Reporting
• 2.6 Follow-up procedures
• 2.7 Periodic Reviews
• 2.8 System-wide analyses

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ESG Part 3 external quality assurance agencies

• 3.1 Use of external quality assurance procedures
  for higher education
• 3.2 Official Status
• 3.3 Activities
• 3.4 Resources
• 3.5 Mission statement
• 3,6 Independence
• 3.7 External quality assurance criteria and
  processes used by the agencies
• 3.8 Accountability procedures

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Major challenges

• Institutions
• Formalisation of quality assurance systems
• Student assessment (including comparability,
  consistency and fairness)
• Information systems
• QA of teachers
• Relating quality culture to quality assurance
• Agencies
• Clarity of purpose
• Professionalism of expert panels
• Use of students
• Reporting
• Independence

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Implementation questions

• Organic development or external imposition?
• Support or hindrance for autonomy and quality
  culture?
• Total compliance or acceptable variations?
• Consequences of 45 local interpretations?
• How to limit the burden on institutions?
• Deadline 2010?

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European Quality Assurance since Bergen

• ENQA
• EU Recommendation
• BFUG 2007 Stocktaking Exercise
• Register of Quality Assurance Agencies
• 1st QA Forum (Munich, November 2006)

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• This is the beginning, not the end, of the job
  quality assurance is a journey, not a destination

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ENQA

• European Association
• for Quality Assurance in
• Higher Education