A quarterly publication of AQU Catalunya

81

April 2016

The member organisations of the IMPALA project (aimed at the impact analysis of external quality assurance processes in higher education) held a meeting in Barcelona to analyse the results obtained in Germany, Catalonia, Finland and Romania. AQU Catalunya has participated in the project as a partner since 2013.

The main instrument of the project is a questionnaire that is administered prior to a QA external review, during the site visit and following at least six months after the site visit. The purpose of this is to assess the impact of the different stages of the review process (self-assessment report, site visit and external report) on the quality of study programmes.

Representatives of AQU Catalunya and the Autonomous University of Barcelona (UAB), together with the other members of the project, discussed a range of topics, from the reliability of the studies, the consistency of the samples and the initial findings from the observation of the perceptions of teachers and students at the start of external reviews and during assessment procedures. The data will be set in context when information regarding their perceptions is obtained when the aforementioned procedures are completed, which will provide a full summary of data to enable coherent conclusions to be reached about the procedures and their impact.