ShareAQU publishes the Standards and criteria for the institutional accreditation of university centres
AQU has published the Standards and criteria for the institutional accreditation of university centres, which was previously endorsed by the Agency's Institutional and Programme Review Committee.
Institutional accreditation provides for simplification of quality assurance procedures in that it replaces individual study programme accreditation with institutional accreditation of an HE provider (a faculty or school) that delivers study programmes. Institutional accreditation by AQU should serve not only to certify the achievement of learning outcomes by way of provision at an institution, but also for the recognition of strengths, good practices and issues that need to be rectified.
Providers must renew their accreditation once every five years by way of a procedure that includes a site visit to the institution by a panel of experts. The document just approved sets the standards for providers that wish to renew an accreditation. These are subdivided into 8 dimensions and 26 sub-dimensions and are fully aligned with the Standards and Guidelines fo r Quality Assurance in the European Higher Education Area (ESG) adopted by the Ministers responsible for higher education in the European Higher Education Area in 2015. The eight QA dimensions deal with:
- Policy and strategy
- Programme design, approval and delivery
- Student admission, progression, recognition and certification
- Teaching staff
- Student-centred learning, teaching and assessment
- Learning resources and student support
- Implementation of the IQAs and academic outcomes
- Public information
AQU will start testing this methodology in a pilot project to be carried out in the providers that are currently accredited, all together a total number of 11 HE providers, along with 15 HE providers that are in the process of obtaining institutional accreditation.