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This paper presents a comprehensive review of existing literature concerning the domains of accreditation and quality assurance in various sectors. Accreditation and quality assurance play vital roles in ensuring the credibility, transparency, and effectiveness of educational institutions, healthcare facilities, industries, and other domains. This paper synthesizes the findings of numerous studies, focusing on the conceptual frameworks, methodologies, and outcomes associated with accreditation and quality assurance processes. The review encompasses a wide range of perspectives, including historical context, best practices, challenges, and advancements in accreditation and quality assurance. Through a systematic analysis of these scholarly works, this paper aims to provide a deeper understanding of the evolving landscape of accreditation and quality assurance across diverse sectors and shed light on potential future research directions.

Applying qualitative methods, this paper examines the burgeoning of quality assurance databases, processes and networks of actors in the field of higher education in Europe. Our main argument is that there has been a move from the Bologna Process being the near singular focus for European-level coordination and harmonisation of higher education, towards the making of a much more diverse and complex quality assurance and evaluation infrastructure. This infrastructure involves a range of distinct but interdependent actors and processes and contains explicit and implicit interlinkages with the production of wider policy agendas, such as the rise of the European Education Area. The aim of this paper is to analyse the growth and complexity of Quality Assurance (QA) in higher education (HE) in Europe, as a way of understanding the multifaceted and continuously developing process of Europeanisation.

Drawing on communities of practice and social cognitive learning theories, this paper explores language teachers' beliefs, knowledge and practices concerning the provision of high-quality education to learners with specific learning difficulties in various educational settings around the world. The data sample for this paper comprises qualitative data (videorecorded interviews and teaching resources) collected from six teachers working across various educational settings (primary, secondary, college and university) across several geographical areas (Europe, Middle East, and Southeast Asia). Thematic analysis was adopted to analyse the data. The findings suggest that teachers continue to experience challenges in educating learners with specific learning difficulties regardless of the educational setting. Limited opportunities for receiving specialised training in this area have been identified by several teachers as one of the key factors affecting the quality of their practice. The change in the mode of instruction from face-to-face to online was not always reported as negatively affecting the quality of educational provision to learners with specific learning difficulties. Technology-assisted online lesson delivery was seen as being advantageous to learners with some types of learning difficulties. Findings from this paper can be useful to teacher-practitioners and teacher-educators who are interested in improving the quality of language education for learners with specific learning difficulties.

About ten years ago, an innovative instrument was developed to promote internationalization in European higher education institutions--"a Certificate for Quality in Internationalization (Cequint)." The initiative fits well the contemporary governance philosophy that promotes voluntary instruments, an individualized approach, and an orientation towards transparency instead of control. While labels and certificates are becoming popular, their effectiveness is often questioned. In this paper we examine critically the value of "Cequint" and its potential for enhancing internationalization. The empirical results confirm that certified study programs outperform their uncertified peers. Partly the effect is explained by self-selection as internationally inclined programs are more likely to apply for the certificate, but there seems to be also a significant independent effect of the certification process. The paper suggests that a voluntary certification scheme can support organizational improvement by three mechanisms: by enhancing motivation, self-awareness, and expertize.

The adoption of a system based on cycles has been one of the core action lines in the Bologna Process. It represents the base for promoting student mobility, employability, and international competitiveness. The implementation of the degree-cycle system -- conditioned by the achievement of other policy objectives (i.e. ECTS) -- started hot debates on multiple levels including on the relevance of different study stages, or the extent to which the curricular emphasis would differ between the two levels. After almost two decades since the reform has been introduced, rather than looking at the state of implementation, current research should focus on how the reform has been implemented and what are its effects. By using the Romanian case as an illustration of the situation in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE), this paper aims to answer the following questions: to what extent have the intentions and expectations linked to the introduction of a tiered structure of degrees have been fulfilled and what are some the (unintended) effects of such reforms? Based on a series of interviews done in November 2017 with academic staff, student representatives and decision-makers from Romania, this paper presents an analysis of the deliberate intentions and expectations of the introduction of the degree structure. The conclusions show that issues related to (1) financing; (2) quality (3) access and participation; (4) content and curricula (5) career path and opportunities after graduation are the main implications of the implementation of the degree-cycle system.

In this paper we consider the experiences of international students studying in Norway, analysing data from more than 5,000 survey respondents. Variations according to students' region of origin and whether they are full degree students or exchange students are the focus. Students report a high level of overall satisfaction, exchange students in particular, and the vast majority of students are content with the quality of teaching. Students from the African continent report being more content than others, despite struggling somewhat more with academic demands and having weaker social networks, something they have in common with Asian students. Multivariate analyses show that type of mobility (full degree cf. exchange), region of origin, coping with academic demands, satisfaction with teaching and interaction with Norwegians are predictors of overall satisfaction with studying in Norway. The patterns observed are assumed to be related to prior experiences and expectations.

This paper discusses empirical comparisons of higher education institutions across world regions. It argues that institutional data systems have the potential for complementing global comparisons promoted by rankings by providing sensible information on institutional size, budgets, staffing, enrolments and activity profiles. With this perspective in hand, this paper tackles three questions. First, how is it feasible to identify Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) given their complex structures? Second, how is it feasible to define the perimeter of HEI sectors? Third, what kinds of data could be used for comparison, and where are the main data gaps? By analysing institutional data systems across the United States, Europe and Asia, the paper concludes that institutional data systems display some remarkable similarities that make them an important resource for global comparisons; however, variation in the context of data production and usage implies differences in the higher education perimeter and on institutional delimitation; sensible comparisons, therefore, require explicit knowledge of the institutional context in which data have been borne.

The article deals with the main aspects of the digital technology impact on education. The aim of the research is to collect and analyze most of digital technologies that have been implemented into educational system of Uzbekistan recently and to find out how they have influenced upon the development of the modern educational methods. The paper presents an assessment of the quality of education on the basis of system performance indicators, which makes it possible to evaluate education in the framework of management criteria based on the results of the participants' preparedness for practical activities. Analysing the foreign and domestic experience, the solution was found out to manage the educational system of the higher education organizations. At the same time, the work stipulates that such an approach should not violate the existing academic traditions and prevent commercial orientation of university management.

This essay explores and examines how rankings and league tables have played (and continue to play) a major and consequential role in how contemporary business schools manage their affairs. It introduces and advances the proposition that rankings promote the short-term manipulation of public reputation (image) projected by business schools at the expense of the long-term investments in quality improvement. When schools shift scarce resources to actions aimed at enhancing their public image in the short-term, the consequences for the quality of the professional education is significantly compromised in the long-term to the detriment of the constituencies that they serve. While this paper focuses mainly on business schools in the United States and Canada, where this author has experienced these consequences first-hand, the effects are similar if perhaps less dramatic, for those professional business programs located in higher education institutions operating in the United Kingdom and Europe. While ranking systems are not going away anytime soon, some potential ways are identified for business schools to escape the deleterious and perverse effects of being captive players in the deadly rankings game.

Education policies can be understood as discursive strategies often used to foreground political ideologies and shape pedagogic practice. This chapter focuses on the ways in which the notion of 'teaching excellence' has received a renewed focus in the context of the introduction of a Teaching Excellence and Student Outcomes Framework for higher education in England. The study adopted a hybrid approach to Critical Discourse Analysis to explore the interplay of discourses underpinning teaching excellence in the context of a policy purporting to assess the standard of teaching in higher education. Drawing on the English case, textual data comprised a White Paper and two policy announcements outlining the introduction of the Teaching Excellence and Student Outcomes Framework alongside 22 written submissions to the 'Assessing Quality in Higher Education' inquiry. Findings revealed four competing discourses: quality enhancement, quality assurance, widening participation and graduate employability. A disjuncture between policy claims and institutional practice was highlighted, with discursive silences regarding access, participation and employability. It is argued that the performative culture generated by such a policy inadvertently encourages institutions to focus on accountability and reputational concerns at the expense of processes which reflect the broader value of establishing teaching excellence in higher education.

In recent years, e-learning and b-learning designs for graduate courses have proliferated in the European Higher Education Area. This paper includes the definition for a model for the assessment of the quality of on-line teaching based on an audit by specialised technical personnel who are independent of the design of the teaching materials and which could be a proposal for the higher education quality assurance models of the European Association for Quality Assurance in Higher Education (ENQA). This template would be useful in undergraduate and graduate courses. This model has been applied in external assessments of the on-line teaching given in the Master's Degree in the Diagnosis of the State of Conservation of the Historical Heritage by the Pablo de Olavide University of Seville, in the 2013-2014 academic year, with the purpose of validating the advantages of the method and examining aspects for improvement in accordance with the Deming cycle, also known as the PDCA (Plan-Do-Check-Act) cycle. The instrument developed for the audits includes all the criteria and indicators considered relevant for quality assessment from a pedagogical perspective. The complete tool, developed in-house, is presented in this article as it is believed that it can serve as a model for the assessment of any on-line teaching.

While universities now lie between two philosophical poles -- idealism and utilitarianism -- the Humboldtian ideal primarily serves to give a humanist glaze to a technocratic discourse. Regardless of its autonomy on paper, the University does not control its finances. This guise of autonomy has set a double authoritarian heteronomy of the university: from increased administrative supervision and from market control. While the current debate is strongly permeated by the idea that we should simultaneously compete with and copy the model of elite US universities, this article presents reflections on how detached from Humboldtian ideals we now are, explores the consequences of that transformational logic and encourages debate through critical distance.

This article shows the potential of the Council of Europe's Autobiography of Intercultural Encounters and Autobiography of Intercultural Encounters through Visual Media to develop quality education in the (foreign) language classroom in Higher Education. Whereas the literature focuses on their contributions to fostering intercultural awareness and reflection as one step to develop intercultural communicative competence in language education, the purpose of this paper is to show that they have a broader significance in terms of the development of three capacities leading to quality education according to Nussbaum, namely critical thinking, imaginative understanding and world citizenship.pro

Responding to the structural and discursive changes that have (re)shaped the area of higher education in Europe over the last decades, the paper presents an analysis of how and with what educational consequences the purpose and value of higher education governance has shifted towards market-relevance and impact as the primary legitimizing factors in institutional quality assessments. The style will be asyndetic: rather than focus on single policy-documents, I purport to avail the justifications of the recent decades' higher education policy through highlighting the use of specific words and certain arguments across a range of documents from the most prominent transnational actors and educational policy-makers in the field. Applying Theodor Adorno's theory of Halbbildung (half-education), I go on to present the notion of Halbbildung as a conceptual lens for unveiling some of the teleological issues at stake in the current proposed purposes and modes of higher education governance. Paraphrasing Adorno's call for commitment to educational authorities, I question the possibility of establishing commitment amongst students to something beyond the logics of applicable competence-building and productivity.

The Bologna Process and its aim of building the European Higher Education Area (EHEA) encouraged its member countries to establish comparable quality assurance systems across the EHEA and consequently, the need to analyse national and institutional responses to supranational development of this field also substantially increased, in particular in under-researched higher education contexts. To this end, the paper addresses the dynamics behind the development (and internationalisation) of quality assurance policies and practices in Slovenian higher education by focusing on the establishment of the national quality assurance agency, on the introduction of the accreditation system and on institutional quality assurance development. Through the lens of institutional isomorphism, it shows that in Slovenia, quality assurance development was largely influenced by preferences of national political actors, which calls into question the convergence of quality assurance policies and practices across the EHEA region.

The starting point of this study is the argument that not only rankings of higher education institutions (HEIs) are inescapable, but so is the constant criticism to which they are subjected. Against this background, the paper discusses how HEIs from Central and Eastern Europe countries (CEECs) are (non)represented in the main global university rankings. The analysis adopts two perspectives: 1) From the point of view of higher education in CEECs--what are the specificity, basic problems and perspectives of higher education in CEECs as seen through the prism of the global ranking systems? 2) From the point of view of the ranking systems--what strengths and weaknesses of the global ranking systems can be identified through the prism of higher education in CEECs? The study shows that most of the HEIs from CEECs remain invisible in the international and European academic world and tries to identify the main reasons for their (non)appearance in global rankings. It is argued that although global rankings are an important instrument for measuring and comparing the achievements of HEIs by certain indicators, they are only one of the mechanisms--and not a perfect one--for assessing the quality of higher education.

Purpose: Graduate admission has become a critical process for quality assurance in tertiary education. Hitherto, most research has investigated the validity of admissions instruments. However, surprisingly little work has been conducted on the overall organization of admission, which often remains "informal, ad hoc, and lacking in continuity." The purpose of this paper is to investigate how to systematically design an admissions process for effectiveness, fairness, and the ability to continually improve, and determine how to condense and analyze the massive amount of data available from student records to obtain high-value feedback for admissions decision making. Design/methodology/approach: An admissions process was systematically designed based on results from process management theory. Tenets of decision theory were applied to the organization of decision making and validity theory was utilized for validating admissions instruments. Performance of the implemented process was evaluated via student records covering a seven-year period. Findings: The authors have designed a four-phase admissions process that ensures high quality through screening, scoping, selection, and evaluation/feedback. The last phase introduces closed-loop control and facilitates stabilization and continual improvement. Additionally, the authors have established a three-stage decision-making hierarchy that promotes consistency and equal treatment in admissions. The evaluations of undergraduate achievements and GRE® General Test scores indicate that both are valid admissions instruments in the European context. Finally, the evaluation of the implemented process provides evidence that decision making has effectively improved over the years and has become more consistent. Originality/value: The systematic design of the admissions process presented generalizes well and is a significant contribution to the organization of decentralized graduate admission.

A key role for educational leaders within undergraduate medical education is to continually improve the quality of education; global quality health care is the goal. This paper reports the findings from a study employing a power model to highlight how educational leaders influence the development of undergraduate medical curricula and the resistance they encounter related to this activity. Sixteen educational leaders at a medical university in Northern Europe were purposefully sampled and interviewed through semi-structured interviews. The results indicate that the educational leaders are feeling powerless when it comes to engaging their colleagues in the process of developing medical education. As a result, these leaders appear having to create a "vicarious legitimacy"; legitimacy connected to other areas than education, such as research or clinic. Research results from this study can be used to develop faculty development programs for health education leaders on national and international levels.

The article deals with outlining guidelines for improving professional training of junior medical staff based on European experience. Consequently, guidelines and recommendations on enhancing the efficiency of medical education in general and junior medical specialists' professional training, in particular, published by European Union of Medical Specialists, General Medical Council, World Federation for Medical Education have been studied, analyzed, justified and presented in the paper. According to European Union of Medical Specialists it has been concluded that general aspects of medical specialists' training are based on the selection process for the access to the medical specialists' training, duration of training, common trunk, training program and quality assurance; requirements for training institutions involve recognition, size, quality assurance and teaching infructructure; requirements for instructors encompass qualification, training program, teacher/trainee ratio; requirements for trainees cover experience, language and logbook. In addition, the components that define the quality of junior medical specialists' professional training based on N. Novosolova's ideas have been indicated. Finally, based on the positive aspects of the guidelines analyzed the appropriate ones that, in our opinion, may be of use in Ukraine, have been presented.

Four financial models of massification of higher education are discussed in this essay. They are American model, Western European model, Southeast Asian and Latin American model and the transition countries model. The comparison of the four models comes to the conclusion that taking advantage of nongovernmental funding is fundamental to dealing with financial difficulty faced by higher education. As a result, it can be argued that the declining of higher education quality does not necessarily have to do with schooling system. On the contrary, the development of private higher education helps the activation mechanism of competition so as to cultivate talents needed by the society.

This paper considers the development of intermediary, or buffer, bodies dealing with quality assurance in higher education in Central and Eastern Europe over the past 10 years. It relates these developments to the context of communist-era centralisation and control, and to more recent interventions by international aid agencies. The lessons that such agencies appear to draw from the Western experience of intermediary bodies in higher education are critically examined. Hypotheses intended to explain the development of different approaches to quality assurance in the region are examined, but none are found to be robust. The paper argues that control, rather than quality enhancement, is the dominating concern of the quality assurance agencies throughout the region. It is further argued that it is important for these agencies to adopt more flexible notions of quality related to institutional goals.(Contains 1 table and 2 notes.)

Argues that higher education is essential for the facilitation of globalization, pointing out that in the Eastern and Central European transition countries, higher education has been a main engine of transition. Asserts that it too must adapt to change, such as the rigors of a market economy that require it to be accessible to all and financed from various sources, and government promotion of centers of excellence. (EV)

A model of quality assessment for higher education that incorporates both accountability (representing extrinsic values) and peer-review/collegiality (reflecting intrinsic values) is outlined. It is presented in both a historical context and the context of experiences with quality assessment in North America and Western Europe. (Author/MSE)

This article provides a critique of current debates about what quality enhancement is for and what it does. It outlines a conceptual framework drawing on different understandings of quality assurance and quality enhancement in higher education, which helps to refine the role of quality enhancement in improving student learning. The paper analyses existing debates on emerging trends in quality assurance and enhancement, particularly within European higher education (HE) systems, with reference to the relationships between research, education, social and economic cohesion, the changing nature of student representation, and learning analytics. A new balance between assurance and enhancement could reconcile ways of thinking generated by higher education, knowledge structures emerging in research communities within the universities, and methods of enhancing learning and teaching which enable a degree of student-led demand.

The paper deals with the professionalisation of higher pedagogical education as a modern global tendency that places new demands on the quality of education, direction and level of training. It has been noted that the modernization of European education appeared legitimate, since geographical and socio-economic transformations have led to the increase of European citizens' mobility. The need for the European labor market's correspondence with international standards of qualification, recognition of diplomas and standardization of education has been thoroughly justified. It has been stressed that the main purpose of the Bologna reforms is to harmonize European educational architecture through the elaboration of common descriptors and quality standards. It has been noted that the increasing demands of the labor market, rapid technological change, globalization, the rise of academic and labor mobility require the use of the competency approach to the formation of would be teachers to improve their professional level, which is a prerequisite and a priority in modernization of higher pedagogical education in Ukraine. The thesis that defines professionalisation as a modern global tendency in the development of higher education has been confirmed. The role of the Bologna agreement in the development of higher education in the EU and Ukraine in the context of implementing a two-stage education, since it deals with a flexible choice of higher educational qualifications and complete upgrade of training programs, as well as strengthening its professional component, has been stressed. The attention has been drawn to the fact that the predominance of bachelor and specialist levels in Ukrainian higher education prevents the effective operation of the master's degree education.

Purpose – Benchmarking, a method for quality assurance has not been very commonly used in higher education with regard to e-learning. Today, e-learning is an integral part of higher education, and so should also be an integral part of quality assurance systems. However, quality indicators, benchmarks and critical success factors on e-learning have not been taken seriously into consideration, nor incorporated in ordinary national or international quality assurance systems. The purpose of this paper is to describe how The European Association of Distance Teaching Universities (EADTU) initiated and developed E-xcellence+, a quality benchmarking assessment method and tool. Design/methodology/approach – This paper, which is part of a larger research project on European benchmarking, focuses on experiences from universities taking part in the E-xcellence+ valorization process. Findings – The results showed that benchmarking is a powerful tool to support improved governance and management in higher education, in alignment with national and international quality agencies. The tool can serve for quality improvements in teaching and learning. Additionally, the results showed critical success issues for e-learning. Originality/value – This original paper reports on a Europe-wide study examining benchmarking of e-learning and presents suggestions for tackling quality issues. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

National policy agendas for quality assurance in higher education (HE) are increasingly influenced by supra-national trends and decisions. Taking Spain, Switzerland and The Netherlands as examples, the paper analyses how supranational trends are re-interpreted at the national level and how recently formulated national policies combine the demands for cross-national harmonisation with the long-lasting influence of decisions and procedures run in the past in the domain of quality assurance. In this perspective, the paper argues that cross-national policy harmonisation, a key prerequisite for the construction of the European Area of Higher Education, is challenged by the long-lasting influence of national path dependent policies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Revista Lusofona de Educacao is the property of Universidade Lusofona de Humanidades e Tecnologias, CEIEF and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Responding to the structural and discursive changes that have (re)shaped the area of higher education in Europe over the last decades, the paper presents an analysis of how and with what educational consequences the purpose and value of higher education governance has shifted towards market-relevance and impact as the primary legitimizing factors in institutional quality assessments. The style will be asyndetic: rather than focus on single policy-documents, I purport to avail the justifications of the recent decades' higher education policy through highlighting the use of specific words and certain arguments across a range of documents from the most prominent transnational actors and educational policy-makers in the field. Applying Theodor Adorno's theory of Halbbildung (half-education), I go on to present the notion of Halbbildung as a conceptual lens for unveiling some of the teleological issues at stake in the current proposed purposes and modes of higher education governance. Paraphrasing Adorno's call for commitment to educational authorities, I question the possibility of establishing commitment amongst students to something beyond the logics of applicable competence-building and productivity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is a decisive move within quality assurance (QA) agencies across Europe to using a greater combination of institutional and programme review, as opposed to exclusively one or the other. This suggests that while HEIs may already have a well-developed system of internal programme review in place, this will become even more important in the future. HEIs already draw on a range of sources for their own internal programme review, including feedback from students and other stakeholders. This article explores the potential of external examining as a means of supporting HEIs in programme review and internal QA. This practice is found in certain higher education systems throughout the world, particularly those that have been influenced by the British system. While often understood primarily as a means of monitoring academic standards, the paper shows how it can extend more broadly to focus on other programme issues and can therefore make a valuable contribution to programme review and internal quality assurance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the value of a research-based student inventory from the quality assurance point of view in two culturally different European higher education institutions for veterinary education. Perceived heavy workload is a wellknown problem in veterinary studies and is a challenge to the quality of learning. First- and third-year students in both institutions responded to an inventory consisting of items regarding their approaches to learning, self-efficacy, study workload and the teaching-learning environment. There were differences in students' approaches to learning and perceived workload between the two institutions. In both contexts, the strongest predictor of the workload turned out to be the surface approach to learning. Self-efficacy showed a positive correlation with the deep approach to learning and organised studying. The strengths of the teaching-learning environment varied between the institutions. Moreover, the present study discusses how the gained information could be used in improving the teaching-learning environment and students' learning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, employability is regarded as an aspect of quality of higher education, or more precisely, the benefit and usefulness of the study programme for career and work tasks. The analyses are based on a comparative survey among graduates in 13 countries, five to six years after graduation. The information about employability, or the usefulness of the study programme related to work is based on the graduates' own perceptions. The extent to which employability is related to characteristics of the study programme is investigated, in addition to country differences and to what extent the differences are affected by the graduates' labour market experiences. The analyses show that study programme characteristics have great impact on the value of the programme in the world of work. These characteristics also have an impact on the initial country differences with regard to employability. The quality indicators have minor influence on the chance of obtaining a job but significant effect on doing the job. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper considers the development of intermediary, or buffer, bodies dealing with quality assurance in higher education in Central and Eastern Europe over the past 10 years. It relates these developments to the context of communist-era centralisation and control, and to more recent interventions by international aid agencies. The lessons that such agencies appear to draw from the Western experience of intermediary bodies in higher education are critically examined. Hypotheses intended to explain the development of different approaches to quality assurance in the region are examined, but none are found to be robust. The paper argues that control, rather than quality enhancement, is the dominating concern of the quality assurance agencies throughout the region. It is further argued that it is important for these agencies to adopt more flexible notions of quality related to institutional goals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper enquires into the implementation of the European Standards and Guidelines for Internal Quality Assurance of Higher Education Institutions (ESG 1). The enquiry uses data from universities in the Czech Republic and compares them against those obtained in the relevant pan-European survey. The aims are to empirically deconstruct ESG 1 translation through instrument mixes, to identify the corresponding implementation styles and to explore the implications of such styles for institutional quality cultures. In these respects, the enquiry yielded three corresponding findings. First, the ESG 1 instrument mixes are complex and entail the application of up to four major types of tools, cutting across the substantive and procedural categories over time. Second, two typical ESG 1 implementation styles were identified: managerial and academic. Third, the managerial style was found to bear on regenerative culture while the academic style bore on reproductive culture. Furthermore, utilisation of hybrid quality cultures (regenerative-reproductive, reproductive-regenerative) was found, depending on internal institutional configurations. It is through verification of these findings in other policy settings that international research on higher education quality assurance may gainfully proceed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This short paper recognises the growth in emphasis in work-based learning as Europe moves forward on economically driven life-long learning. We support such a move and point to issues which still need to be resolved. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to address the problem of job satisfaction determinants of higher education graduates across six selected study domains. Design/methodology/approach – Based on the theoretical considerations, derived from human capital theory and signalling theory, the authors formulate the model explaining job satisfaction as a broad measure of labour market success. Explanatory variables include various socio-demographic characteristics as well as market environment and process of learning, modes of teaching and study programme characteristics. Data used in the analysis comes from two special surveys of European research projects REFLEX and HEGESCO. Principal component analysis method and OLS regression were used to estimate model parameters. Findings – The results of our research show the important role of characteristics of educational process, as well as individual graduates’ early work-related experience in predicting job satisfaction. Differences in job satisfaction determinants across domains may be to some extent explained by the differences in the labour market characteristics for graduates in given discipline. Variety of education-related characteristics taken into account in the empirical analysis of determinants of job satisfaction is a key valuable contribution to the research in the field. Originality/value – Research findings indicate the areas of potential actions aimed at improving future job satisfaction which can be undertaken by higher education institutions’ management bodies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of RIE: Revista de Investigacion Educativa is the property of RIE: Revista de Investigacion Educativa and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Quality Assurance Review is the property of Romanian Agency for Quality Assurance in Higher Education and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The paper presents the results of a comparative analysis of the quality of higher education in seventeen member states of the European Union in 2007. The author applies two methods of multivariate analysis. The first one is called Principal Components Analysis and the second is linear ordering. These two methods help assess the similarities and differences between countries and also place countries in order from the best to the worst. The author examines such variables as the organization of higher education and curricula, the governance of higher education institutions and funding. All of these variables influence the quality of higher education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Quality is becoming a very important issue in higher education institutions toward gaining competitive advantage in this changing and dynamic environment. Bologna process seeking to unify or standardize the rules for higher education on the transfer of credits, free mobility of students and pedagogues etc, as well as the accreditation aiming quality assurance in higher education institutions, basically have as the main focus to improve the quality of universities in terms of teaching and on scientific research, which will make universities known. Nowadays, universities in developed and developing countries are using more and more continuous quality improvement methods, combined with the accreditation and implementation of the Bologna process, which constitutes the basis for ensuring the success of the these universities in the future. Even in Albania, universities are in a stage of continuous development by using many of the same continuous quality improvement methods like in western universities, are in a stage of accreditation and changing the curricula and the system according to Bologna Process. In this paper, through the use of literature, the questionnaires and interviews directed mainly to the professors / pedagogues working in Albanian public universities, the focus is to show the importance of accredition and Bologna process for Albanian universities, the continuous quality imporovement methods used, and to test the hypothesis: The majority of professors / pedagogues think that the correlation between Accreditation - Bologna process - Continuous Quality Improvement is a strong positive correlation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]