Naslov
Assuring and improving the quality of tertiary education

Autori
Lučin, Pero

Vrsta, podvrsta i kategorija rada
Poglavlja u knjigama, stručni

Knjiga
OECD thematic review of tertiary education country background report for Croatia

Urednik/ci
Dujić, Željko ; Lučin, Pero

Izdavač
Ministarstvo znanosti, obrazovanja i sporta Republike Hrvatske

Grad
Zagreb

Godina
2007

Raspon stranica
110-122

ISBN
978-953656934-2

Sažetak
The Act on Higher Education Institutions (1993), amended in 1996 and 2000, introduced a national system of quality assurance, and defined the responsibilities and tasks of the Ministry of Science and Technology, which was responsible also for TE, the National Council for Higher Education (NCHE), and TE institutions. The NCHE was established by Parliament as an advisory body to the Government, universities and others, with the aim to develop evaluation procedures and recommendations for quality improvement. Two separate aspects to the national quality assurance system were introduced: accreditation, which is a legal process and the responsibility of the MoSES to approve or disapprove of institutions (i.e. universities and faculties), and quality assessment, which was the responsibility of the NCHE. The NCHE was expected to advise TE institutions about the quality of their programs. The NCHE used the conventional approach of self-assessment, peer review and site visits, and initiated an external evaluation of institutions (faculties) by an expert team, usually consisting of one member from abroad. The external evaluation was preceded by a serious and extensive self-evaluation prepared by the institution, which already altered and improved institutional policy. After the site-visit, the expert team prepared its peer review report. However, the report was not appropriately used for institutional accreditation and thus, in many cases, legal consequences were avoided. In addition, the NCHE developed certain procedures that are linked to the accreditation of study programs and a set of recommendations for quality improvements at the national level. These recommendations were used in developing study programs and evaluation procedures, but these were not systematically implemented in all institutions. Therefore, they did not result in a clearly recognized and official policy both at the national and at the university level. A major reason for such inefficiency in the development of institutional quality assurance policy lies in the structure of the university, which is fragmented into faculties as legal entities.Furthermore, the model of state governance in TE is tied to the lack of university autonomy in a number of areas. In addition, the NCHE was not allotted the appropriate resources (human and financial) and was not able to organize as an independent competent body.

Izvorni jezik
Engleski

Znanstvena područja
Informacijske i komunikacijske znanosti

POVEZANOST RADA