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QUALITY ASSURANCE: ISSUESAND POLICY IMPLICATIONSLazär VläsceanuPublished online: 02 Aug 2006.

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HIGHER EDUCATION IN EUROPE, Vol. XVIII, No. 3,1993

QUALITY ASSURANCE: ISSUES AND POLICYIMPLICATIONS

LazarVLASCEANU

• The essay begins by linking the questions ofquality guarantees and maintenance, par-ticularly in eastern and central Europe, to theprocesses of higher education reform, both ofwhich are being generated by the expansionand the diversification of higher educationsystems, management reform, the need toprotect professional standards, and the inter-nationalization of learning. The latter factor,which has as its practical consequences thequestions of the recognition and theequivalence of studies, diplomas, and degreesand of academic mobility in general, requires

internationally agreed upon standards of qualityassessment. Thus a discussion of the many facetsof quality is introduced into a discussion leadingto the consideration of policy implications ofquality assessment. This in turn leads to a con-sideration of accreditation, a condition and set ofprocedures more widespread in the USA than inEurope. Quality assessment and the develop-ment of appropriate mechanisms for its as-surance are linked to questions of finance andmanagement. These mechanisms are bothspecific to the country in question and interna-tionally oriented.

QUALITY AND REFORM INHIGHER EDUCATION

The assessment, assurance, andpromotion of quality in higher educa-tion are major issues of concern forall higher education systemsthroughout Europe, if not throughoutthe world at large. These issues arealso very much related to reformingtrends and activities.

In the countries of central andeastern Europe, the reform of highereducation systems not only regardsinstitutional structures, curricula,administration, and management, butquality assurance mechanisms aswell. Indeed, the latter are majorconcerns. Each higher education sys-tem and institution is seeking thosedevelopments which have quality astheir hallmark.

The issue can be viewed from twobasic perspectives which are notnecessarily convergent.

According to one view, quality as-surance practices, criteria, andstandards existed before the recentpolitical changes, as they still do now.The problem is one of designing andimplementing the reform whilepreserving the already existing quality.According to other views, althoughthe quality of higher education wasindeed assured (many illustrations ofthis reality can be cited), the new na-tional and international contexts re-quire the development of new prac-tices and mechanisms so as to betterrespond to the newly established orexpected purposes of the reform ofhigher education.

While the first perspective puts theemphasis on the continuity of existing

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quality assurance practices in highereducation, the second looks for andopens up new ways of approachingthe subject, thus stressing a very realdiscontinuity. Indeed, the firstperspective is more defensivelyoriented, searching , as it does, forvalues which are already operating inthe system, whereas the second takesas its reference the values which areemerging in the new societal contextsor existing elsewhere, particularly inthe West.

These varying views on the qualityof higher education may in the finalanalysis be considered by some asdialectically complementary in thesense that for certain academic fieldsthe need may only be one of securinginternational recognition for stand-ards already achieved, whereas forother fields, new internationallyrelevant standards must be definedand their attainment secured.

The problem here, however, is notone of comparing the two perspec-tives in order to demonstrate certaindifferences or complementarities.The crux of the matter is that the wayin which quality is viewed in the highereducation systems of the central andeastern European countries has astrong impact on the processes ofreform and on the policies which arebeing envisaged or carried out. In-deed, quality assurance has long beenvalued in all universities worthy ofthe name; however, the new concernshave brought up new issues and prac-tices with important consequencesboth within and outside the systems.Quality assurance itself is perceivedas a domain of the reform and also asa way to define and to implement it.

The inclusion of quality within thedomain of reform may lead to thedevelopment of specific institutionsand practices. Quality assurance be-comes a subject of legislation and ofstructural adjustments in systems ofhigher education. Another approachputs the emphasis on the use ofquality management in order to bet-ter elaborate policies for the develop-ment of higher education institutionsand systems. In fact, some systems ofhigher education in the subregionhave already created institutionsresponsible for quality assurance,thus providing policy-makers andacademics with information on theworkings of the systems and recom-mendations for decision-making.

Some systems are already develop-ing appropr ia te mechanisms ofquality management. Higher educa-tion policies and decisions regardingtheir development are being increas-ingly based on information derivedfrom specialized information gather-ing centres. Institutions for quality as-surance should hold a prominentposition among the latter while at thesame time providing qualified valuejudgments. While certain differencesbetween quality assessment proce-dures and structures may exist as aresult of varying organizational tradi-tions, a common referential coreshould be defined in recognition ofthe trend favouring the increased in-ternationalization of universities. Ex-changes of views and experiencesshould be promoted in order to en-large this common core and to stimu-late the implementation and develop-ment of reforms in higher education.

Quality and reform in higher educa-tion are the catchwords of our times.

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While reform seeks structural andfunctional changes, quality stands asthe frame of reference for the aims andresults of higher education, thusproviding permanent feedback withregard to the ways reform is conceivedand implemented. The approaches tothese issues may vary from system tosystem, but the end results should beincreasingly convergent, thus creatingand enlarging a core of principlesdefining a European conception ofhigher education.

GENERATING FACTORS

The high priority given to the issue ofquality in higher education by allcent ra l and eastern Europeancountries has arisen from varioussources. It would be useful to identifycertain objectives of policy-making inhigher education in the domain ofquality assurance.

The Expansion and Diversificationof Higher Education Systems

A first generating factor is related tothe rapid expansion of higher educa-tion systems since 1990. A relatedaspect is the very rapid increase instudent enrollments, varying from 6to 70 per cent, in the countries of thesubregion. One may account for thistrend by offering certain historicalexplanations, primarily the mismatchbetween the high demand for highereducation on the part of the popula-tion and the small number of open-ings which the State had made avail-able in the past. Although necessary,this very rapid increase in studentnumbers has been occurring at a mo-ment when the educational supportservices as well as the numbers ofacademic staff are insufficient.

Under such conditions, the quantita-tive expansion of enrollments has ledto the expression of doubts as to thequality of the education provided,many observers sharing the view thathigher education institutions havebeen forced to lower their standards.

Another aspect of the expansion ofenrollments is related to the horizon-tal and vertical diversification of in-dividual institutions in systems ofhigher education.

With regard to the horizontal co-ordinate, three tendencies can beidentified. One consists in thegeneralization of higher education,that is, the opening of many newuniversities or similar institutions.Another tendency has been struc-tural diversification within existinginstitutions, through the creation ofnew faculties focussed on areas ofknowledge which were neglected inthe past (e.g., ecology, management,business administration, etc.). Stillanother tendency has led to the ap-pearance of private higher educationinstitutions, these representing an al-together new phenomenon which cur-rently operates in a legal vacuum.

Vertical diversification consists inthe introduction of a wide spectrumof higher education offerings so as toprovide the labour market withgraduates having differentiatedqualifications. In particular, short-cycle higher education of two to threeyears' duration should be mentionedas well as postgraduate education ofvarious levels in addition to the moreclassical types of Higher education.

The problem with regard to thesetypes of institutional diversificationis that they have often occurred as

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fragmented changes produced by ex-pedience and by various temporarypressures and interests. They also re-quire careful analysis of the ways bywhich quality is assured.

The increase in the participationrates and the strong institutional ex-pansion and diversification of systemsunder conditions of financial con-straint have raised doubts as to thequality of the products of the systems.The need for quality assurancemechanisms and procedures is thusbeing expressed strongly both withinand outside the system. The emer-gence of private institutions of highereducation in parallel to public ones,set up outside any legal provision, isan additional incentive for estab-lishing a system of quality assessmentand accreditation.

The Management of HigherEducation Systems

Another factor which is generatingconcern with regard to quality as-surance has its origins in the manage-ment of higher education systems.For many political and historicalreasons, university autonomy has be-come a concept of major concern inall the higher education systems ofcentral and eastern Europe. Thebasis of the relations between thehigher education institutions and theacademics, on one hand, and thegovernments, on the other, has un-dergone rapid change. The highereducation institutions have thus ac-quired a certain degree of autonomy.However, while striving to extendtheir autonomy as much as possible,and making every effort to escapefrom any co-ordination by centralstate bodies, the universities are con-

tinuing to rely, partially, if not entire-ly, on government subsidies.

Different consequences derivefrom this trend. One is related to theproblems of administration andmanagement of entire higher educa-tion systems and of their constituentinstitutions. There is a need todevelop appropriate managerial anddecision-making skills. In addition,university autonomy should be close-ly related to the responsibilities ofhigher education to fulfill certain so-cial functions and to be accountableto society at large. The decentraliza-tion of system-wide management andinstitutional autonomy are not pos-sible without specific provisions withregard to accountability for resour-ces and without specific agreementson educational standards.

Therefore, whatever the develop-ments and consequences of the reformprocess in higher education, they aredirectly related to the establishment ofnew management bodies and prac-tices, and to the creation of highquality and relevant evaluation sys-tems. Such systems might be en-visaged as an interface betweengovernment and higher education in-stitutions, their functions being thoseof laying down criteria and standardsand of developing quality assessmentand assurance mechanisms.

Professional Standards

The need to relate accountability tothe quality of higher educationshould also be considered from theperspect ive of the concerns ofvarious professional bodies. Certainprofessions, mainly those within en-gineering, business, medicine, and

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law are making efforts to havespecific national and internationalstandards of quality in professionaleducation recognized. One may addto this effort the parallel effects ofregional and global trade agree-ments, such as those developed by theEuropean Community or by theNorth America Free Trade Agree-ment (NAFTA), which are expectedto put pressure on professional as-sociations to define common accept-able standards for education and fur-ther training.

This trend in favour of institutingprofessional standards of a corpora-tive type is bound to have consequen-ces on a wide international scale, par-ticularly with reference to central andeastern European countries, generat-ing the need to develop effectivequality assurance systems which arecompatible educationally and profes-sionally with those that already exist.

The Internationalization of Learning

The internationalization of learningis another driving force for thedevelopment of higher education inthe central and eastern Europeancountries. It too is making a strongimpact on the need to introduce ap-propriate mechanisms of evaluationlinked both to the expansion of inter-national co-operation and academicmobility of students and of staff, andto the recognition of diplomas,degrees, and studies. For reasonswhich are a matter of commonknowledge, the higher education in-stitutions of the central ond easternEuropean countries were preventedfrom participating in more thanlimited international co-operation.The level and quality of their

programmes have yet to be dis-covered by their eventual partners.When the problem of studentmobility and the transfer of credit israised, universities are not onlyasking for information about thecontents of study programmesbut also about their quality. Therecognition of diplomas and ofvarious study certificates is increas-ingly based not only on specific legalprovisions, st ipulated in inter-governmental conventions, but also oninformation regarding the status ofspecific higher education institutionsand the quality of their curricula.

The increased internationalizationof higher education may be viewed asleading, on the one hand, to a certainharmonization of degrees, contents,structures, and standards, thusfacilitating a greater and freermobility of students, researchers, andteachers. On the other hand, thistrend risks diluting and eveneliminating the different culturalheritages reflected by national sys-tems. However, the increased inter-nationalization of higher educationmust not necessarily be viewed asclashing with the objectives of build-ing up and preserving national valuesand systems. On the contrary, the twodimensions can be complementaryand as such they should be furtherexplored.

Quality assessment systems mayprovide specific possibilities for thecomplementary development of na-tional and international standards ofacademic relevance and excellence.

Other generating factors of con-cern to quality in higher educationcan be identified. Almost everything

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going on in higher education is, inone way or another, linked to the is-sues of quality. From this perspec-tive, quality is the catchword of alldevelopment in contemporary highereducation. However, in order toavoid transforming it into a "hurrahword" of approval or dismissal(Barnett, 1992), one should lookmore closely at what quality inhigher education means and how itmay be substantiated in terms of policy.

FOCUSSING ON THE QUALITYOF HIGHER EDUCATION

So far, the quality of higher educa-tion has been treated as if the matterwere well-known and clearly defined.If this were so, the question of policydevelopment would not raise anyproblems. However, the situation isby no means clear, and many latentand active conflicts of interest shouldbe considered.

Quality, it seems, is more easilyrecognized than defined. Subjectiveconnotations are always implicit orexplicit. Moreover, the conclusionresulting from an evaluation processis subjectively formulated. How doesone ground subjective judgments inorder to reduce their range of varia-tion? To search for an answer meansbasically to hunt for criteria andstandards, thus, as much as possible,eliminating those sources whichmake the final results of an evalua-tion subject to controversy or to con-tingency. Criteria and standardsrefer to judgments about evaluation.Reducing their variability wouldallow for resolving eventual disagree-ments and for passing from a highlevel of subjective uncertainty to oneof, so to say, objective subjectivity.

One may consider criteria whichare common to a particular type ofhigher education institution and/orto any of its components. The im-plication is that criteria of qualitycannot be agreed upon unless a clearconception of what higher educationmeans has been elaborated and madethe object of general agreement.While such a statement might appearto be a banality, considering the longhistory of universities in Europe, theideas of what a university or highereducation institution is or should beare multiplying not only in the sensethat the label as such is overused incircumstances far from whatacademic history consecrated, butalso because the criteria for settingup institutions included under theumbrella of higher education havebeen extended far beyond the classi-cal limits of acceptance. Criteria, asmeans for making judgments, shouldtherefore be complemented with ref-erence to standards. Each criterionshould correspond to a set of stand-ards, and each standard should en-compass a range of variation from theminimum level of acceptability to thelevel of academic excellence. Thestandards are expected to providemeans of measuring or simply ofevaluating those dimensions, charac-teristics, or attributes inherent towhat a criterion indicates.

The problem is threefold:

- to identify the domains of evalua-tion (a higher education institu-tion as a whole, parts of it, and ifso, which parts: research, teach-ing, learning, administration);

- within each domain, to specifythe criteria which are considered

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in the process of assess-ment/evaluation (taking a highereducation institution as an ex-ample, reference can be made tothe criteria of financial efficien-cy, addressed in terms of the so-called unit costs and otheranalogous measures);

- it then follows, for each criterion,that the standards must bedefined in terms of variation fromthe level of minimal acceptabilityto that of desirability (e.g., finan-cial efficiency) or of academic ex-cel lence (e.g., teachingeffectiveness).

The standards will vary both interms of level and kind, according tothe context and the purpose of theenvisaged course, project, or institu-tion of higher education.

In defining standards, one must beaware of the relativity of the term. Atthe same time, the effort to improvequality and to raise standards, that is,to pursue excellence, is a crucial co-ordinate of the university itself - allthe more so in that "conventional oraccepted standards, in changing cir-cumstances may become the enemyof high quality" (Moodie, 1988).Standards and quality do not neces-sarily coincide. Sometimes standardsmay be kept so low that they are farbelow what is normally expected of ahigher education institution, or, onthe contrary, they may be set so highthat no higher education institutionor only a few of them could be ex-pected to attain them.

The problem of focussing on thequality of higher education thereforehas philosophical as well as practicalimplications. While leaving the

philosophical aspects to researchers,policy-makers may well look for solu-tions to the practical problems of as-sessing, assuring, and improving thequality of higher education. How-ever, one should not ignore the viewthat to identify the various domainsof evaluation requires one to have aclear understanding of the varyingconceptions of higher education.This is all the more important as theera of the multiversity (Kerr, 1963) ormegaversity (Thompson, 1991), andthe market-driven society have givenrise to the problem of too many con-ceptions of what institutions ofhigher education and their functionsshould be.

To focus on the quality of highereducation therefore means: (a) tosearch for meanings of quality; b) tospecify how quality is to be assessed,assured, and improved; and c) to con-sider various policy implications forquality evaluation in higher education.

As a wide spectrum of develop-ments is available with regard to eachof these issues, let us refer briefly toseveral of them.

Searching for Quality

There is no way to provide a universaldefinition of the quality of highereducation. The conception of highereducation is closely linked to themeanings attached to its quality andto the values shared by the com-munity to which a higher educationinstitution belongs. When communityvalues are expressed in the guise ofaims or purposes of higher educa-tion, quality should reflect "fitnessfor purpose" (Ball, 1985). If the pur-pose of higher education is that of

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training highly qualified manpowerfor the labour market, its quality maybe assessed by examining the output,i.e., the destinations of the studentsand their professional achievements.However, if the basic purpose is thatof the intellectual and moral develop-ment of students, or of their self-realization, the appraisal of qualityshould be focussed not on economicindicators of output, but on exploringthe ways by which the instructionalprocesses within higher education in-stitutions have provided oppor-tunities for student self-realization.

The list of purposes may be ex-tended according to the values in-vested by the community in highereducation. However, the problem isnot so much one of extending the listas of searching for the origins of pur-poses. In this case, one may distin-guish between those purposes thatare set from within higher educationby the academic community, andthose set from outside higher educa-tion by the surrounding (social,economic, and cultural) community.

These two categories of purposesmay coincide or clash, totally or par-tially, permanently or temporarily.Also, because various agents, work-ing within higher education institu-tions (students, teachers, re-searchers) or benefitting from theirwork, may perceive purposes dif-ferently, quality may be assessed dif-ferentially. A tension, which shouldnot necessarily be perceived as nega-tive, may even arise between variousagents related to higher education.On the contrary, as Birnbaum as-serted, referring to the American sys-tem of higher education (1989, p. 33),"it is the tension between the views

that provides the diversity thatprotects and strengthens the highereducation system".

Basically, one may distinguish be-tween two views. The first is externalto the process of higher education,viewing it in terms of inputs, outputs,and the "black box". Policy-makers,funders, and institutional managersare more interested in assessingquality against such criteria as theproduction of qualified manpower,research publications, social demandfor higher education and oppor-tunities to meet this demand, teach-ing provision, etc. So much the betterif these criteria are expressed inclear-cut quantitative terms.

The other view is focussed essen-tially on the internal aspect of theprocess of higher education, givingexpression to such criteria as thedevelopment of the integrity andautonomy of individual students, oftheir learning and intellectualabilities, etc. Obviously these sorts ofcriteria are much less amenable toquantitative evaluation even if theyare more relevant for those directlyinvolved in the process, particularly,the students.

The distinction between the twobroad views of quality should notlead, however, to any cleavage or tomutual exclusiveness which would af-fect the basic idea of higher education.

Quantitative measurements havebeen developed in the form oiperfor-mance indicators in order to provideaccurate information on systemoperations and activities. Their at-tractiveness is based mostly on thepossibilities which they offer for theincorporation of a great deal of (ap-

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parently) rigorous information intothe manageria l or budgetarymachinery. It is their rationalizingfunction with regard to certain in-stitutional activities that makes themuseful for the process of quality as-sessment, policy-making, and institu-tional management. But this functioncan occur only when the applied per-formance indicators point to specificmanagerial and procedural activities,when they are valid and reliable, andalso when they are employed with dueprecaution.

The range of domains for whichperformance indicators have beendeveloped is increasing, covering notonly the inputs (human and financialresources) and the outputs (productsof higher education), but also theprocesses and their efficiency and ef-fectiveness. Indicators may help toidentify certain trends with regard toperformance or to signal areas inwhich policy action is needed. Theyshould not, however, dominate themanagement process nor lead to thestandardization of higher educationinstitutions. In other words, theyshould not be put to unlimited use.Performance indicators cannot beeasily transferred from one highereducation system to another. Theyneed to be elaborated and/or ad-justed according to the specificity ofeach system and put to use after acertain experimental period duringwhich they are tested. Moreover,qualitative judgments are and shouldbe omnipresent. Quantitative perfor-mance indicators should not be usedas substitutes for sound policy judg-ment, but as providers of systematicinformation on certain domains ofhigher education. Their complemen-

tarity with regard to the availablequalitative information must berecognized and applied.

From Quality Assessment toQuality Improvement

When one refers to the quality ofhigher education, one is confrontedwith a rather wide range of expres-sions: quality assessment, qualitycontrol, quality assurance, qualityimprovement, quality management.Although this usage is based on theassumption that quality exists, theproblem is one of getting at it. Onemay go further and say that each ex-pression has certain meanings as-sociated with it that are more-or-lesstransparent or opaque as related tothe interests of various agents.

Quality control is usually carriedout by governmental bodies, for in-stance, inspectorates, using the tech-niques of quality assessment. The ob-jectives of quality control and assess-ment may be of concern not only withregard to the varying differentiallevels of quality so as to promote ap-propr ia te policies, but also tospecific ways of providing assurancesthat quality, as fitness for purpose, isactively promoted and permanentlyimproved. In other words, the basicaim is one of assessing quality inorder to design and to implement ap-propriate policies for its further im-provement. Thus the need fordeveloping mechanisms of qualitymanagement, both at the system andat the institutional level, follows.

Two levels have to be considered:(i) Central management, referringbasically to the tasks performed byministries and/or by associated mini-

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sterial bodies, and (ii) Institutionalmanagement of quality with referenceto both academic affairs and ad-ministrative matters.

At the first level, faced as they arewith the decentralizing trend infavour of the development ofautonomous higher education institu-tions, the governments of central andeastern European countries mustdefine new responsibilities for theircentral management bodies. Giventhat the consequences and implica-tions of structural decentralizationare not easily predictable, and whenone considers that the systems ofhigher education hold strategic posi-tions in the future development oftheir countries, the option of nothaving a central body for qualitymanagement cannot readily be ac-cepted. However, the central body incharge of the management of highereducation quality should not neces-sarily be of a ministerial type. Thecreation of new management bodies,i.e., buffer organizations, can alsoplay a central role. An intermediarybody in charge of quality manage-ment can be set up and placed be-tween central government bodies andhigher education institutions in sucha way as to increase the participationof different interested actors andinstitutions.

At the second level, if highereducation institutions in central andeastern Europe are to be expected toreact flexibly to new conditions, theirsystems of quality management mustbe thoroughly changed. Such changeimplies, on their behalf, the assump-tion of the principles and the prac-tices of sustained adaptability.

One issue, however, is ofparamount importance when itcomes to quality management ofhigher education, namely that ofacademic management. The implica-tion is that the assent of the academiccommunity is a prerequisite for effi-cient and reliable use of any manage-ment techniques. This assent may besought formally, through decision-making structures, or informally,through different routes . Thetransparency of all the endeavoursand results must be the rule, thusfully committing the academic com-munity to the evaluation of quality. Itis only through the participation ofacademics in the processes of qualityassessment and through thetransparency of the managing proce-dures that one may envisage realgrounds for a passage from quality as-sessment to quality assurance and thusto permanent quality improvement.

The final result of all activitiesfocussed on academic quality musttake the form of mechanisms and in-centives for its assurance and im-provement. In order to achieve thisgoal, self-responsibility and manage-ment transparency, grounded onclear and appropriate criteria andstandards, are crucial preconditions.One must view policy-makers as per-sons who, while not directly involvedin the task of quality management,have worked to establish and to or-chestrate the framework and the pro-cedures of quality assurance andquality improvement.

In this respect, the relating of thetwo modalities of quality assessment:(a) institutional self-assessment and(b) external quality assessment, ac-quires great importance.

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Through processes of self-assess-ment, institutions of higher educa-tion provide the academic com-munity with possibilities to reflect ontheir purposes and effectiveness withregard to the examination of theirstrengths and weaknesses, and to ex-plore solutions and opportunities ofaction. Through processes of exter-nal assessment, opportunities areprovided for peer review from out-side the assessed university and fromabroad. Such peer review allows forgoing beyond a mere parochial viewin order to permit comparisons andharmonizations of quality. Whenbased on common criteria of refer-ence, opportunities are offered fordiscussions and negotiations, thusfacilitating the objective elaborationof quality assessment criteria.

The two modalities of quality as-sessment - internal (self-assessment)and external (peer review) - are bothnecessary and complementary. Theyprovide the policy-makers with basicand sound grounds for decisions withregard to the steering and planning ofhigher education and institutional ac-countability.

Policy Implications of QualityAssessment

Students and parents, researchersand academic staff members,employers, taxpayers, and govern-ment officials all attach great impor-tance to quality in higher education.All these agents want information onacademic quality in order to groundcertain options, to make appropriatedecisions, and to increase competi-tion between and among highereducation institutions. If diversifiedbut powerful interests are coupled

with the growing need to assess, toassure, and to improve quality, thepressures on higher education in-stitutions and on whole systems couldbecome overwhelming. The resultmight be short-term actions takenwithout a thorough testing of theirreliability and validity. The resultmight be great damage to already ex-isting quality instead of improve-ment. An exploration of the policyimplications of quality assessmentshould be made well in advance, andboth short-term and long-term ac-tions considered. A consideration ofcertain areas for macro-level policyimplications follows.

Academic Mobility and Recognition

Academic mobility with the ensuingneed for recognition of studies,diplomas, and degrees as phenomenais constantly increasing. Variousschemes of academic mobility exist inEurope, some of them including thecentral and eastern European sys-tems of higher education. In thedomain of diploma recognition,specific bilateral and multilateralconventions are operating, while anew convention, jointly elaborated byUNESCO and the Council of Europe,is envisaged.

One issue, which is more or lessopenly raised in discussions onacademic mobility and recognition,regards the level of the standards ofhigher education in certain centraland eastern European countries,considered as being lower than thosein western systems. Various inter-pretations are also being made ofprofessional qualifications, par-ticularly as these relate to the dura-tion of studies.

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ISSUES AND IMPLICATIONS

While specific quality assurancemechanisms are to be defined and im-plemented within each system ofhigher education, no system can ig-nore the corpus of general scholarlyvalues and world scientific standards.Here one should evoke a necessaryEuropean dimension of the quality ofhigher education which is intended toact as a facilitating factor in thegranting of academic recognition andin the mobility of students, re-searchers, and teachers. Whateverthe approach, however, a trulyEuropean dimension of the quality ofhigher education cannot be taken forgranted. Both within and between na-tional systems, a widening diversity isevident, and one should look for waysand mechanisms to strengthen theimplied convergence in terms of bothnational and international policies.

Three issues may be addressed inthis respect:

- a definition of the legal orstatutory provisions for qualityassurance and management ofhigher education institutionswithin each system, providingthat a European dimension,based on scholarly values andscientific standards, is also con-sidered;

- the introduction of specificprovisions for academic qualityand the accreditation of highereducation institutions into thenewly envisaged European Con-vention on the Recognition ofStudies, Diplomas, and Degrees(jointly elaborated by UNESCOand the Council of Europe);

- increased international co-operation between the national

bodies in charge of academicquality assurance and manage-ment by the establishment, underthe auspices of the UNESCOEuropean Centre for HigherEducation (CEPES), of a net-work for the exchange of infor-mation and experiences.

Accreditation

Accreditation is much less developedin Europe than in the United Statesbecause of the traditionally muchstronger governmental supervisionand control of educational institu-tions in Europe. However, the rapidexpansion of the number of publicinstitutions without adequate financ-ing, and that of private institutions ofhigher education in many central andeastern European countries impliesthe necessary and rapid developmentof accreditation bodies and proce-dures. In this respect, fairness is themost important reference value forthe treatment of private universities,with regard to both students andemployers (provision of informationin terms of quality which has beenobjectively assessed and assured)and to private initiatives in highereducation.

Sometimes accreditation andquality assessment and assurance arenot related, but considered to be al-together different matters. At othertimes, they are viewed as overlappingsynonymous terms for one and thesame thing. The discussion is notsimply one of semantics withphilosophical implications. The finalresult may have important, short- andlong-term legal implications for theinstitutions concerned.

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One view shared by manyspecialists is that quality assuranceand accreditation are complemen-tary. Accreditation is based on andfollows up quality assessment. Ac-creditation is not a licensing or a cer-tification procedure, which, accord-ing to current views, is applied onlyto individuals. Rather it is the proce-dure for granting a recognized statusto an institution which complies withset quality standards. A process ofquality assessment may or may notend up with the granting of accredita-tion to an institution of higher educa-tion which voluntarily sought it.While institutions which are alreadyaccredited may periodically submitthemselves to both internal and ex-ternal quality assessment and carryout quality assurance activities on apermanent basis, an institution mayspecifically seek accreditation andsubmit itself to predefined andagreed upon procedures of qualityassessment. However, the status ofaccreditation does not guarantee thestandard of each graduate or of eachcourse programme. The proceduresof quality assessment are meant toprovide accurate and reliable infor-mation to all interested parties withregard to the quality of education of-fered by and assessed in an institu-tion as a whole. Thus accreditation isinstitutional.

Accreditation is not granted to aninstitution on an indefinite basis. Itmust be periodically renewed. Theinstitution must resubmit itself toquality assessment. Information isgathered on the ways quality has beenassured and even improved; however,if the opposite is the case, if stand-ards have fallen below established

levels, accreditation may bewithdrawn.

Thus, accreditation is a statuswhich is granted to a higher educa-tion institution which is intended topromote innovation, to increase com-petition among institutions and sys-tems, and to permanently raise thestandards of quality.

The following modalities shouldbe considered:

- the setting of specific criteria,standards, and procedures of in-stitutional accreditation;

- legislation concerning therelationships between quality as-sessment and assurance proce-dures and mechanisms, on theone hand, and accreditation, onthe other;

- the creation of appropriatebodies of quality assessment andaccreditation, usually of a non-governmental type, providingclose relationships with theacademic community, profes-sional associations, and/or repre-sentatives of the world of work.

Financing and Management ofHigher Education

The financing of higher education isone policy domain to which qualityassessment is directly related, albeitone which gives rise to manydebatable problems. This situationprevails not only in the countries withlong traditions of decentralizedmechanisms for the financing ofhigher education institutions, butalso for those in which the issues ofaccountability have been related to

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ISSUES AND IMPLICATIONS

the outcomes of quality assessmentactivities.

In the central and easternEuropean countries, the provision offunds for higher education is a highlycritical problem. During the transi-tion period, characterized by adecrease in economic growth and anincrease in inflation with resultingshortages in all sectors of society,higher education systems are lookingfor new alternatives of financing andof allocating scarce budgetaryresources. Although certain solu-tions have been found and even im-plemented, many problems remain tobe tackled and solved.

The question of the accountabilityof higher education institutions callsfor the introduction of certain marketrules into the systems. It thereforebecomes necessary to set upmechanisms of public control overthe cost, the performance, and theoutput of individual institutions. Inorder to increase the quality and theefficiency of higher education, inter-institutional competition for fundsshould be introduced along with asystem of performance indicators forfacilitating evaluation. Howeverstrong the drive towards the market isin other societal sectors of thecountries of the subregion, resistanceto its introduction into higher educa-tion and the ensuing consequences isgoing to be as strong.

Indeed, the higher education sys-tems and institutions of the sub-region, faced as they are with newchallenges and organizationaldevelopments, must now find new ap-proaches to and types of financing

mechanisms related to quality assess-ment methodologies.

Two levels should be considered:

At national level, appropriate sys-temic relationships between highereducation management (includingfinancing) and quality assessmentshould be developed. One may opteither for inducing diversity into thesystem, in terms of quality provisionsand the corresponding funds avail-able, or for maintaining anegalitarian allocation of funds whileincreasing quality control and qualityassurance on a voluntary basis ineach institution. The first alternativeimplies the setting up of mechanismsfor increased control over quality,while the second provides fewer in-centives for qualitative improvement(an institution with a mediocre per-formance record is funded at thesame level as one with a better per-formance record).

At institutional level, importantchanges with reference to bothacademic quality assurance andmanagement and administrationshould be introduced. One may en-visage possibilities for monitoringthese changes inter-institutionally bysetting up a nongovernmental body ofan intermediary, buffer type, mediat-ing between higher education institu-tions and the State.

FURTHER CONCERNS

The current debate over the qualityof higher education is and should belinked to current changes in oursocieties and to the reforming trendsin higher education. The activities ofquality assessment and assurancecannot be seen as value-free, techni-

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cal matters, which may be easily im-ported and implemented regardlessof the overall conception about thefuture development of specificsocieties and of the higher educationsystems that are parts of them - themore so in that higher education isplaying a strategic role during thisperiod of transition of central andeastern European societies to marketeconomies and pluralistdemocracies.

It therefore follows that thedevelopment of appropriatemechanisms of academic quality as-surance and assessment has twoclosely linked dimensions. One isfocussed on specificity, that is, thedevelopment of national bodies andinstitutional mechanisms of qualityassessment and assurance closely re-lated to specific value systems andconceptions of higher education. Theother dimension is internationallyoriented, which means that nationalvalues, criteria, and standards ap-plied in the evaluation of highereducation should be widely com-

patible with those developed in othercountries, this in order to facilitateacademic mobility and diplomarecognition. The balancing of the twodimensions is a true challenge to befaced and mastered by a variety ofmeans.REFERENCES

BALL, C, Fitness for Purpose (Guildford:SHRE and NFER - Nelson, 1985).

BARNETT, R., Improving Higher Education.Total Quality Care (Guildford: SRHE and OpenUniversity Press, 1992).

BIRNBAUM, R., The Quality Cube: How Col-lege Presidents Assess Quality", in, Quality in theAcademic World: Proceedings of a National Sym-posium (College Park: National Center forPostsecondary Governance and Finance, Univer-sity of Maryland, 1989).

KERR, C , The Uses of the University(Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1963).

LUCIER, P., "Les Indicateurs de performancedans l'enseignement supe'rieur: Un de"bat et desenjeux a de'dramatiser", in, Gestion del'enseignement superieur, 4 2 (1992).

MOODIE, G.C., Standards and Criteria inHigher Education (Guildford: SRHE and OpenUniversity Press, 1988).

THOMPSON, D. L., Moral Values and HigherEducation (Provo: Brigham Young University, 1991).

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