Building Bridges in Higher Education: Quality Assurance

1. Professor Dr. Mohammed Abdul Aziz Vice ChancellorUniversity of Information Technology & Sciences (UITS)BangladeshWeb: http://www.uits.bd.eduEmail: info@uits-bd.org, aziz@uits-bd.org Building Bridges in Higher Education: Quality Assurance

2. Silk Road extending from southern and eastern Europe through Egypt, Somalia, the Arabian Peninsula, Iran, Central Asia, Indian Subcontinent, Java-Indonesia, and Vietnam until it reaches China. The land routes are red, and the water routes are blue.

3. The Changing Global Environment • Knowledge as a Key Factor in Development • The Information and Communication Revolution • The Global Labor Market • Political and Social Change

4. Opportunities and Threats stemming from Changes in the Global Environment

5. Building Bridges • Bridges as metaphors What bridges? • between different organizations and stakeholders in higher education • between higher education, business and society • across geographical borders, time and space, disciplines and learning methods

6. Globalization and Higher Education: Building Bridges The foundations for these bridges: • The World Declaration for Higher Education in the Twenty-first Century • The Global Forum on International Quality Assurance, Accreditation and the Recognition of Qualifications

7. UNESCO GLOBAL FORUM –The Action Plan • Standard-setting activities • Capacity Building in QA and different modes of delivery • review of regional conventions • principles for responsible partnerships in cross-border education • generating empirical evidence through research on the impact of trade in education and the concept of the public good • Clearinghouse: Information Tools for Students

8. A Way Forward • Greater participation from all regions, including Ministers and governmental representatives • higher education at the centre of social sustainable development.

9. Building bridges: from words to action (1) • Strengthen regional conventions • Research on Widening access to higher education through trans border provision

10. Building bridges: from words to action (2) • Principles for Responsible and Sustainable Partnerships between HE, Business and Society • Develop a continuum model for partnerships between HE and society that would take account of differences in needs, capacities and issues • Empowering Learners: Students Choice Behavior • Results of Studies on Students Choice Behaviors • Flexibility of choice: link HE with Lifelong Learning

11. Currently, as centers of education, knowledge, innovation, talent and business, universities are expected to provide society with three primary functions: Entrepreneurship & Spirit of Innovation Globally Engaged Network Platform for Sustainability 3

12. Challenges in Knowledge Economies Transformation from Industrial to Information age Knowledge Economy and Knowledge Society Rapid Growth and Urbanization Population Diversity and Immigration Thus, universities are faced with critical challenges while priming to address society’s needs, which include:

13. Cultivate creative capital Generate knowledge capital Train human capital Build social capital Attract financial capital Preserve natural capital Produce spillovers to regional and national economies Universities Provide the Core However, universities are the primary locus of opportunity to address challenges associated with innovation, economic expansion, and population growth for the city-state. They:

14. Academic Success, Economic Strength For example, trends indicate that highly educated populations and higher university funding influence a higher per capita income Geographic concentration of highly cited scientists http://www.casa.ucl.ac.uk/citations/citations_maps.htm Per capita income (1999) Source: U.S. Census Bureau,Census 2000 Summary File 3, Matrix P82 8

15. Why Quality Assurance is Necessary? • Massification of Higher Education • Diversified Higher Education System • Risk of Lowering Academic Standards • Globalization and Economic Integration • Growing Danger of “degree mills” and “accreditation mills” • National Quality Assurance Systems should act in accordance with the International Standards

16. International Network for Quality Assurance Agencies in Higher Education (INQAAHE) • Established in 1991 and has NGO status with UNESCO • 200 Members from 6 Continents and 80 Countries • Main Purpose: To collect and disseminate information on current and developing theory and practice in the assessment, improvement and maintenance of quality in higher education

17. International Network for Quality Assurance Agencies in Higher Education (INQAAHE) • Promotes good practices in the maintenance and improvement of quality in higher education and facilitates research into the practice of quality management • Provides advice for new quality assurance agencies and facilitates links between accrediting bodies

18. Memorandum of Cooperation with INQAAHE • Arab Network for Quality Assurance in Higher Education (ANQAHE) • ASEAN Quality Assurance Network (AQAN) • Asia-Pacific Quality Network (APQN) • Caribbean Area Network for Quality Assurance in Tertiary Education (CANQATE) • Central and Eastern European Network of Quality Assurance Agencies in Higher Education (CEEN) • Eurasian Quality Assurance Network (EAQAN) • European Association for Quality Assurance in Higher Education (ENQA) • European Consortium for Accreditation (ECA) • Ibero-American Network for Quality Assurance in Higher Education (RIACES) • Quality Assurance Network for African Higher Education (AfriQAN)

19. Quality Assurance in European Higher Education Area (EHEA) • Globalization requires mobility and competitiveness which widens the market for higher education • Bologna Process: • Bologna Declaration includes 46 member states in Europe (plus EU COM with voting rights) and 8 consultative members (CoE, EUA, ESU, EURASHE, EI, BE, UNESCO, ENQA) • Concentrates more on teaching and learning than on research

20. Quality Assurance in European Higher Education Area (EHEA) The E4 group (ENQA, EUA, EURASHE and ESIB/ESU) has developed the European Standards and Guidelines (ESGs) comprising three key components: • Standards for internal quality assurance within higher educational institutions • Standards on external quality assurance of higher educational institutions • Standards for quality assurance of quality assurance agencies

21. Questions and Challenges about EHEA • Quality assurance agencies are still largely restricted to traditional higher education: degree programs leading to Bachelor's / Master's degrees • Transnational education, Lifelong learning is still largely located outside the scope of quality assurance and is insufficiently accredited

22. Quality Assurance should examine whether the degree program of a university: is oriented towards explicit and published learning outcomes takes into account the necessary workload leads to the necessary competencies and skills is student-centered and not traditionally teacher-centered observes the qualification framework enables students to use opportunities of mobility

23. Quality Assurance in Asian Universities The higher education landscape and Transformation of quality assurance in the Asian Region is characterized by: • Cultural, linguistic, social, political and economic pluralities • Many growing economies • Increasing attention to higher education and its quality • Considerable diversity in quality assurance systems, approaches and stages of development • Need for a regional harmonization of frameworks and approaches • Increasing regional cooperation

24. Quality Assurance in Asian Universities ASEAN Quality Assurance Network (AQAN) aims: • To promote and share good practice of quality assurance in higher education in the region • To collaborate in capacity building • To share information and to facilitate the mutual recognition of qualifications throughout the region • To develop a quality assurance framework for Southeast Asia

25. Internal and External Quality Assurance of Higher Education • Internal Quality Assurance: Through self assessment, the institution tries to discover its own quality and to find its strengths and weaknesses. • External quality Assurance: It often serves two masters: • It helps the institutions to enhance and to improve the quality • It provides information for government, policymakers and taxpayers

26. Perspective of the Universities of Bangladesh and UITS • 30 Public Universities and 54 Private Universities exist Bangladesh • External Quality Assurance: • Ministry of Education, Bangladesh • University Grants Commission of Bangladesh (UGC) All Public and Private Universities of Bangladesh are controlled by External Quality Assurance Authority

27. Perspective of the Universities of Bangladesh and UITS UITS has Internal Quality Assurance Committee in addition to External Quality Assurance Authority: • Quality Assurance Committee of UITS • Quality Assurance and Improvement Society (QAIS): • UITS is the founding member of QAIS

28. Executive Board of QAIS

29. Mission of QAIS • Has a mission appropriate to higher education • Guided by well-defined and appropriate goals for student learning • Assesses both institutional effectiveness and student learning outcomes, and use the results for improvement

30. Mission of QAIS • Enhancement of quality of higher education • Quality education assurance is primarily the responsibilities of higher educational institutions themselves and should respect institutional integrity • Promoting academic freedom and intellectual and institutional integrity

31. Mission of QAIS Ensuring that higher education is accountable to its various stakeholders and in the protection of their Interests. Stakeholders includes- • Students and potential students • Their families and other individuals who provide them with financial and other supports • Employers • Governments • Foundations and other agencies that support the work of higher education. • The wide community, including the internal, external, regional and international community

32. Mission of QAIS • Review Process of the Society should be independent and should not be subject to external influences whether from governments, institutions or elsewhere • Should be carried out in the context of criteria and procedures that are published in advance of any review

33. Mission of QAIS • Decisions made by the Society should be based on clear and published criteria and should be reached after the application of transparent processes and procedures • QAIS recognizes that a great deal of co-operative work with the other organizations or agencies of same objectives is conducted at internal, external, regional and international level

34. Mission of QAIS • Establishing transparent processes and procedures for institutional and program accreditations based on published criteria • Identifying a set of core guidelines that should strengthen the Society’s activities • Collaborating and Cooperating with other organizations/agencies of similar objectives at local, regional, and international level

35. Functions of QAIS • Advocacy of Quality Assurance and improvement • Formulation of indicators and measurement instruments • Development of consensus on the indicators and measurements • Encourage the setting up of internal Quality Assessment mechanisms

36. Functions of QAIS • Initiating self assessment • Inviting submission for peer review (voluntary) • Inviting submission for external review • Conducting review process • Development of assesses and reviewers • Providing feedback for improvement (no rating)

37. Functions of QAIS • Training, workshops, seminars of Quality Assurance • Full assessment of Higher Educational Institution on voluntary basis • Non rated certification on Quality Assurance • Institutional review • Program review

38. Review Panel of QAIS • Reviewers should consist of academics from abroad with experience of Quality Assurance providing a balance of western and regional membership for institutional and program review • After completion of institutional review of most Higher Educational Institutions, the review process will be fully internalized with external participation as may be necessary

39. The future will belong to those regions that have strong knowledge-based economies, built on the success of their universitiesas knowledge producers 12

40. Thank You!