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'Role of national levels refering to Quality Assurance Agencies', speech by Guy Aelterman, board member ENQA and NVAO, at the Hochschulrektorenkonferenz (HRK) Bologna seminar, Berlin, February 15th-16th 2007

Only the spoken word counts.

Introduction

One of the major objectives of the Bologna declaration was to create a European Higher Education Area and to further academic and professional mobility. Although the agenda was educational, there were aspects on economic development and expectations in it as well. If we say mobility, this implicitly means recognition of qualifications. 

Bologna tools

To realize these Bologna objectives, the Ministers gave us a set of wonderful tools:

• Create the same qualification structure for the whole of Europe;
• Promote the development of a sustainable quality assurance system all over Europe.  

Hence, we created the bachelor/master qualification structure and - mostly national - quality assurance agencies ensure good quality of programmes and institutions on the national and international level. The key factor and the only option to further academic and professional mobility is the external supervision of assurance agencies to ensure quality in higher education. 

Before Bologna

We all know that quality assurance did not start with the Bologna declaration, but was already in place since the early sixties of the last century. The modern approach towards quality assurance started after World War II, in a period when the European cohesion was not as strong as it is today (?) and the European idea was only beginning to grow. Quality assurance developed much stronger on the national level than on the European level. Therefore, different quality assurance systems were applied in several countries. 

Bologna implementation

Furthermore, we need to take into account that the implementation of Bologna implies:

• that it has to be translated into national legislation;
• that this does not take place at the same pace in all countries;
• nor does it take place in the same way.  

As a consequence, the way quality assurance systems are developed may differ considerably between countries, which manifests itself in the chosen quality assurance system and in the aims and objectives, the topics, the general focus and the evaluation methodology that are adopted. 

Berlin communiqué (2003)

Taking into account the different systems in Europe on quality assurance and the consequences that this may have on the development and creation of an European Higher Education Area , Ministers decided in Berlin (2003) to develop a set of standards and guidelines to enable the different countries and quality assurance agencies to harmonise quality assurance systems. 

Bergen communiqué (2005)

This leads us to the Bergen communiqué in which the Ministers of Education agreed upon a set of tools to put in force the view and pathway to a European Higher Education Area:

• An overarching framework derived from the Dublin descriptors. This framework sets down the outcome levels for all masters and bachelors. This tool is extremely important for the realisation of a European Higher Education Area and more specifically for the mutual recognition objectives;
• Standards and Guidelines for quality assurance (EGS) at the level of the institutions, the external assessment and the assessment agency were accepted. Those S&G are generic, applicable on programme and institutional evaluations and in line with those used in other international networks such as INQAAHE;
• The principles of a European Register for Quality Assurance Agencies;
• And finally , for the first time, mutual recognition was explicitly mentioned in a Bologna follow-up communiqué. 

EGS

However, the implementation of the ESG lead to discussions about some tricky points:

What do we mean by independence?

• on the level of the panel composition;
• in the production of a panel report;
• and in the final decision-making (who decides);
• the question of independence directly and indirectly concerns human resources.

How public do reports need to be and what is the underlying meaning of the different levels of publicity applied by the agencies:

• The complete report as well as the final decision (NVAO);
• Only the positive decisions, including the report (OAQ);
• Only decision with summarised conclusions and recommendations (some German agencies);
• Only an assessment report but not the final decision (VLIR);
• Only mention of accredited programmes or institutions (EFMD).

Appeal:

• In Sweden, appeal is prohibited by law;
• In the Netherlands and Flanders, there is an internal and external appeal. 

We believe that the most logical approach is to take into account cultural and historical differences and to give agencies indications as to measures for improvements to be taken in account for the coming years.

Mutual recognition

Meeting the ESG means that we meet the quality criteria or standards on higher education shared within the European community of higher education. It is a guarantee for quality and therefore creates trustHowever, this is only the first step towards mutual recognition. The final aim is the recognition of qualifications. An accreditation decision by a quality assurance agency cannot immediately lead to mutual recognition of qualifications, at the most it can lead to mutual recognition of the accreditation decision itself.  

We need good procedures or at least guidelines to come to mutual recognition of accreditation decisions, we need to be explicit in what exactly we recognize, knowing that recognition of qualifications cannot be the task or competence of an QA agency. 

What do we mean exactly by mutual recognition of accreditation decisions? In simple terms, it means that "If I, as agency A, were to implement the accreditation that agency B has implemented, I would achieve the same result." To come to mutual recognition of accreditation decisions, we need to go through a step-by-step process,

• Analysis of mutual standards and procedures (a);
• Recognition of mutual standards and procedures (b);
• Recognition of results of assessments (c);
• Recognition of accreditation decisions (d). 

Such process is certain to succeed provided:

• there is mutual trust between the cooperating agencies;
• people accept a certain diversity of criteria and procedures;
• people accept mutual verification of data and results. 

This assumes that:

• where necessary, national regulations must be amended;
• exchange and cooperation projects between the different accreditation or quality assessment agencies will be set up;
• networks of accreditation or quality assessment agencies will be developed.

The mutual recognition of accreditation decisions rather easily allows a statement to be made on the level of a programme (bachelor's or master's). The statement regarding the orientation of the programme (to what degree is the orientation academic or professional) and regarding the subject-/discipline specific requirements will be more difficult to make. Both the bachelor's and master's levels are clearly described in the Dublin descriptors or in the overarching qualification framework, both of which are widely accepted.

The following steps are more difficult to take. First of all, there is the aspect of programme orientation: the bachelor's and master's professional or academic orientation and to what degree a programme is embedded in research. The approaches of the different countries, usually laid down in legislation, differ considerably. This has to do with the historical and/or cultural background, or the (national) reference frame according to which higher education is organised.

One has to conclude that the division into professional and academic qualifications as such is becoming untenable. The focus is more often on qualifications that are a mix of professional and academic orientation, the concept of research ranging from fundamental, via applied, to practice-based research. How then do we deal with orientation in international comparisons and in mutual recognitions? The answer is that this should be based on the comparison of  competences acquired within the programme and validated by assessment and accreditation and possibly confirmed in a diploma supplement. 

As to subject-/discipline specific requirements, here we can use the same approach as for the programme orientation. A lot of projects try to determine the subject-/discipline specific requirements on an international, i.e. European level: examples are projects like Tuning, EUR-ACE, Polyphonia. They can offer a appreciable help in the mutual recognition of qualifications.  

Finally, the last step, namely the mutual recognition of qualifications is determined by the institutions themselves. Taking into account the Lisbon recognition convention (1997), mutual recognition of the accreditation decisions, diploma supplements and the task of the ENIC/NARIC's, the HEI take the final decision in recognising qualifications. 

In the just mentioned approach, we always speak about academic recognitions. Professional recognitions are still more complicated. Those recognitions regulate the entrance into the labour market and are largely dependent on the competences of trade organisations, ministries of economic affairs, in other words, they are generally subject to national regulations, even economic protective measures.
The interaction between mutual recognition of accreditation decisions, the Lisbon convention, agreed multinational subject-/discipline specific competences and learning outcomes and European professional guidelines for entrance into the labour market should stimulate both academic as well as professional mobility.

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