TABLE A1
FROM:
Old Wine in New Bottles? A Comparison of Public and Private Accreditation Schemes in Higher Education
Bjorn Stensaker and Lee Harvey
BACK TO ARTICLETable A1. Summary of vital criteria in six higher education accreditation schemes
| EQUIS | ABET | NOKUT | NVAO | TTA | GMC | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Institutional financial support | The institution demonstrates financial viability | Institutional support and financial resources (inc. support personnel and services) | Adequacy and effectiveness of resource deployment | |||
| Resources and facilities | Adequate classrooms, laboratories, computing infrastructure | Infrastructure (library, teaching and learning facilities, ICT) | Facilities and provisions (physical) | Learning resources and facilities | ||
| Student support | Student services (e.g., effective professional student services) | Student guidance and information, including possible study-hindering aspects) | Student support, guidance and feedback | |||
| Teaching staff resource | Recruitment, development and management of faculty, support for personal development in skills like management, ethics, leadership | Sufficient faculty, skills and competencies | Appropriate level of qualifications in the academic staff and external examiners, adequate number of staff, pedagogic qualifications, research involvement | Quality and quantity, experience and expertise | ||
| Teaching | Teaching performance judged against targets for student outcomes | Quality of tutoring and school-based training activities | Delivery of the curriculum, supervisory structures, teaching and learning | |||
| Student selection | HEI recruits and selects high quality students | HEI has and enforces procedures to assure that all students meet programme requirements | Procedures for selecting trainees | Appropriate student selection | ||
| Programme structure and content | Coherent programme design, staffing, administration and evaluation | Programme has educational objectives that are published. Programme criteria (e.g., basic knowledge within a certain discipline relating to the title of the programme) | An appropriate name, objective, curriculum and progression in the study programme and equal academic level as other similar programmes | Aim and objectives of the degree programme; content and structure of the programme (inc the relationship between aims and content, coherence, duration) | Course content and structure | Curricular content, structure: knowledge, clinical and practical skills |
| Programme outcomes | Programme outcomes and assessment (e.g., graduates apply knowledge, conduct experiments, function in multi-disciplinary teams) | Results judged against targets | Standards achieved by trainees, includes knowledge, professional values and practice | Curricular outcomes: the principles of professional practice, putting the recommendations into practice, legal issues re: medicine | ||
| Assessment | Assessment and study load | Assessment of trainees | Assessing student performance and competence, principles of assessment, assessment procedures, appraisal, student progress | |||
| Professional element | Professional component (e.g., quantitative indicators on the required length of study modules in maths and science) | Confidentiality for medical students, the responsibility of students and HEI to protect patients | ||||
| Research | HEI has a clearly defined research and publication policy | |||||
| International | Internationalization (e.g., of student body, faculty and programmes) (Not as strong in practice as in criteria) | National and international cooperation (e.g., the existence of well-established international networks for students and staff) | Process driven by Bologna, internationalization of programmes and of evaluators | |||
| Employer/ professional body links | Connections with the corporate world (e.g., input from practitioners in programmes, involvement of the corporate world in the institutional governance) | |||||
| Internal quality assurance | Programme evaluation | Process for evaluate the objectives, and a system of on-going evaluation | Evaluation (e.g., routines for assuring and development of the quality of teaching and learning) | Internal quality assurance system (periodic review, evaluation of results, measures for improvement, involvement of staff, students, alumni and the professional field | Quality assurance procedures and improvement planning | |
| National standing and scope | HEI is officially recognized and regarded as a major quality institution and has substantial first-degree programmes and postgraduate programmes | |||||
| Mission | HEI has an articulated sense of mission | |||||
| Governance | HEI has an effective and integrated organization for the management of its activities | |||||
| Strategy | HEI has a defined, credible and coherent strategy | |||||
| Main method | Peer review | Peer review | Peer review | Peer review | Inspection | Peer review |
| Main purpose | Market positioning (audit for self-improvement) | Accountability | Accountability, claims improvement but contested possibility | Compliance and accountability, assumes improvement | Compliance aiming at continuous improvement |