Quality Assurance in the Nordic Higher Education - ENQA

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ENQA Occasional Papers

K. Hämäläinen

J. Haakstad

J. Kangasniemi

T. Lindeberg

M. Sjölund

Quality Assurance in theNordic Higher Education

– accreditation-like practices

ENQA Occasional Papers 2

European Network for Quality Assurancein Higher Education • Helsinki

Preparation of this report is co-financed by Nordisk Ministerråd.

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The views expressed in this Occasional Paper are those of the authors. Publication does not imply eitherapproval or endorsement by the European Network for Quality Assurance in Higher Education or any ofits members.

© European Network for Quality Assurance in Higher Education, 2001, HelsinkiThis publication may be photocopied or otherwise reproduced without any specific permissionof the publisher.

Cover layout: Jussi Hirvi / Green Spot Media Farm

ISBN 951-98680-2-XISSN 1458-1051

Printed by MonilaHelsinki, Finland 2001

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Foreword

ENQA has in various contexts been actively involved in the process of follow up on the Bologna declara-tion. One implication has been a focus on the potential role of accreditation in quality assurance of highereducation. A group of member agencies from the Nordic countries joined in 2000 in a common project toanalyse the concept of accreditation and identify accreditation procedures and other practices, similar toaccreditation, in the Nordic countries. The agencies involved were the Danish Evaluation Institute, TheFinnish Higher Education Evaluation Council, The National Agency for Higher Education, Sweden andThe Network Norway Council.

The project has resulted in a report that provides a clear account of Nordic thinking on accreditationand evaluation, but also contains a very coherent and understandable general account of the various issuessurrounding accreditation and evaluation at the present time.

The Steering Group has therefore decided to publish the report as an ENQA Occasional Paper makingthe report one of ENQA’s contributions to stimulating the forthcoming European discussions on qualityassurance and accreditation.

Christian ThuneChairman of the Steering Group

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Contents

1 Introduction________________________________________________________________ 5

1.1 Context ____________________________________________________________________ 5

1.2 Objectives __________________________________________________________________ 6

2 The Concept of Accreditation _______________________________________________ 7

2.1 Accreditation and other related terms __________________________________________ 7

2.2 Accreditation and evaluation __________________________________________________ 8

2.3 Accreditation in practice _____________________________________________________ 9

2.4 Limits of accreditation ______________________________________________________ 11

2.5 Critical points of accreditation _______________________________________________ 11

3 Why Has Accreditation Become a Central Issue? ____________________________ 14

3.1 Trust and accountability _____________________________________________________ 14

3.2 A common labour market and student mobility requirements ____________________ 14

3.3 Borderless markets for higher education ______________________________________ 15

3.4 The proliferation of accreditation systems: from USA to Europe __________________ 16

3.5 Trans-national accreditation systems _________________________________________ 16

4 Quality assurance and accreditation-like practices in higher education _______ 18

4.1 Denmark __________________________________________________________________ 18

4.2 Finland ____________________________________________________________________ 20

4.3 Iceland ____________________________________________________________________ 23

4.4 Norway ___________________________________________________________________ 26

4.5 Sweden ___________________________________________________________________ 29

5 Conclusions and Suggestions ______________________________________________ 33

5.1 Tradition and background ___________________________________________________ 33

5.2 Accreditation and quality assurance in the Nordic countries today ________________ 34

5.3 Accreditation in a Nordic perspective _________________________________________ 35

5.4 Accreditation in a wider international perspective _______________________________ 36

5.5 Final remarks ______________________________________________________________ 37

References and related bibliography _____________________________________________ 38

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1.1 Context

For about ten years, representatives from the na-tional higher education evaluation agencies in theNordic countries have convened for annual networkmeetings in order to share experiences and discusscurrent issues. One form of this co-operation hasbeen the publishing of joint reports. A good exam-ple of this work is the book, Evaluation of HigherEducation in the Nordic Countries (1996). Its aimwas to sum up and disseminate Nordic evaluationexperiences for the benefit of institutions, agenciesand ministries.

In May 2000, the following agencies met inCopenhagen:

• the Danish Evaluation Institute• the Finnish Higher Education Evaluation

Council• the National Agency for Higher Education,

Sweden• the Network Norway Council

The main theme of this meeting was accreditation,which has become one of the central topics in dis-cussions on higher education policy in Europe inthe wake of the Bologna process. This shift towardsdiscussing and recommending the use of accredita-tion schemes as a more prominent tool of qualityassurance poses a challenge to the Nordic countries,who have traditionally relied more on the dualmechanism of governmental approval and devel-opment-oriented evaluations.

In spite of a general reluctance to run explicitaccreditation programmes, there are still quality as-surance activities in place in the Nordic countriesthat are essentially accreditation, although they donot carry that label. It is also evident that even in-side the culturally homogeneous Nordic region, ac-creditation-related procedures are far from identi-cal. There are variations in practice from one coun-try to another, and even standard terms may carrydifferent nuances of meaning.

For these reasons, the Copenhagen meeting tookthe initiative to have the status of accreditation inthe Nordic countries reviewed and analysed. Hope-fully, this may help each of the four countries informing useful strategies for their internal qualityassurance work, and facilitate the mutual under-standing of accreditation and recognition proceduresacross the national borders.

However, a discussion of accreditation from aNordic perspective must also reflect the need forwider international mechanisms to ascertain thequality of degrees and to promote their trans-na-tional mobility. The report may, therefore, also beof interest and value in a European context, withparticular reference to the commitment of the Bo-logna Declaration to “promote European co-opera-tion in quality assurance with a view to developingcomparable criteria and methodologies.”

This report is a joint effort of five writers fromthe participating Nordic countries. First of all, theyformulated the aims of the report and planned itsstructure. Each one has participated in the writingprocess. The texts have been circulated between thewriters via e-mail. The writers have also met fivetimes to discuss the texts. This report represents theopinions of the writers.

The writers would like to express thanks to allwho have supported the writing of this report. Thecountry case of Iceland is written by Ásger urKjartansdóttir and was added to the texts during thefinal phase of the project. Also, Dorte Kristoffersenfrom Denmark and Anna-Maija Liuhanen from Fin-land have provided valuable comments for the fi-nal version of this report. Financial support for theproject was received from the Nordiska Minister-rådet.

1 Introduction

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1.2 Objectives

Higher education institutions in the Nordic coun-tries derive their formal degree-awarding capacityfrom the State. National degrees are supposed to bedirectly comparable and of equal standard, and theaims, scope and general structure of degrees are,therefore, prescribed by law. The State protects thevalue and quality of degrees by controlling whichinstitutions can award them, and which educationalprogrammes can qualify for them. In this sense,Nordic governments keep for themselves the for-mal power to grant official approval in the field ofhigher education. It is only natural that the Statewants to maintain some control over the provisionof higher education – private as well as public – aslong as it is mainly funded by public money.

On the other hand, higher education institutionsalso enjoy great autonomy, partly ensured by law.Among other things, this autonomy implies that theinstitutions themselves take full responsibility forthe standard and quality of the educational servicesthey provide. Responsibility, though, is an emptyword unless it also means accountability, that is,responsibility to some authority. As direct govern-ment control through a system of reporting andsteering would contradict the very principle of in-stitutional autonomy, the answer has been to buildup semi-independent national quality assuranceagencies and evaluation systems to obtain the nec-essary quality judgements. Quality control by evalu-ation is gradually replacing quality control by gov-ernment steering. But it is still a typically “Nordic”feature that the role of independent evaluations vis-à-vis the government is to inform and advise,whereas the government has the last word in ques-tions of approval.

Each of the Nordic countries has found its ownway of balancing the roles and powers of the insti-tutions, the national quality assurance agency andthe government. At the same time, these roles andpowers are continuously under debate and scrutiny,as the question of how closely the institutions shouldbe monitored and assessed is always a delicatematter. To complicate matters still further, the Bo-logna Declaration indicates the need of a more har-monised practice on approval and quality assurancein a “European higher education area”. To whatextent will European policy have a standardisingeffect on national practice? And will accreditationthen be the answer?

The modest ambition behind this report is to helpclarify what is meant by accreditation, to describehow accreditation is related to other approving orrecognising functions in the four Nordic countries,and to discuss, tentatively, some options for the fu-ture. The report will try to illuminate the followingpoints:

• What is meant by accreditation?• Why does the importance of accreditation seem

to be increasing?• What accreditation (and accreditation-like)

procedures can be identified in the Nordiccountries today?

• What challenges do international developmentsin this field present to quality assurance in theNordic countries?

• Do the Nordic countries have common needsand interests in relation to these developments?

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The term accreditation is not a very precise one. Inone sense, it expresses the abstract notion of a for-mal authorising power, acting through official de-cisions on the approval (or not) of institutions orstudy programmes. In another sense, the term re-fers to the issuing of a quality label to institutionsor programmes. In both cases, a judgement isreached through certain assessment processes.

Accreditation can be defined in several ways, asin the following three examples:

a) “Accreditation is a formal, published statementregarding the quality of an institution or a pro-gramme, following a cyclical evaluation basedon agreed standards.” (CRE, 2001)

b) “Accreditation is a process of external qualityreview used by higher education to scrutinise col-leges, universities and higher education programsfor quality assurance and quality improvement.”(CHEA, 2000)

c) “Accreditation is the award of a status. Accredi-tation as a process is generally based on the ap-plication of predefined standards. It is primarilyan outcome of evaluation.” (The European Train-ing Foundation, 1998)

Accreditation, then, can have different definitions,forms and functions, but the way the term is usedin this report, it will always have the following char-acteristics:

• Accreditation gives acceptance (or not) that acertain standard is met in a higher educationcourse, programme or institution. This may be aminimum standard or a standard of excellence.

• Accreditation, therefore, always involves abenchmarking assessment.

• Accreditation verdicts are based solely on qual-ity criteria, never on political considerations.

• Accreditation verdicts include a binary elementand are always either “yes” or “no”.

Accreditation can be seen as one of several com-plementary measures in a quality assurance system,

whose starting point is the need to maintain andimprove good quality in institutions of higher edu-cation. Evaluations will normally assess to whatextent a programme or an institution is meeting thelevel of quality set by the programme planners orthe institutions themselves, whereas accreditationpasses a verdict on whether a programme, degreeor an institution meets certain outside standards orrequirements. The specific object of accreditationis to certify a defined standard of quality, althoughit may be imbedded in a larger evaluation processwith multiple aims. The crucial question is: whosets the standards?

2.1 Accreditation andother related terms

Accreditation, in the sense it is used here, shouldbe kept separate from a few other related terms,which in this report will mean the following:

• Approval: an official decision (without an explicitaccreditation process) that a course or a pro-gramme qualifies for a national academic degree,or that an institution has the right to confer na-tional degrees. Such approval is usually givenby the Ministry of Education.

• Recognition: the formal acceptance that a degreein one country leads to the same rights and con-sequences, for example, for further degrees orfor the access to regulated. professions or to thenon-regulated parts of the labour market, in an-other country.1

• Authorisation: an official decision that a certaineducation or training gives the right to practice acertain profession. Such decisions normally lieoutside the higher education system itself.

2 The Concept of Accreditation

1 “Recognition” might also have been used with the meaninggiven to “approval”; Our choice of terms is made in order toavoid confusion with ENIC/NARIC terminology, where“recognition” has this meaning.

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As a function, accreditation comes close to “ap-proval”, in the sense that it aims at giving officialacceptance to a course, a programme or an institu-tion in relation to the right to confer degrees. Theoutcome of an accreditation process is always a“yes” or “no”, which is also exactly what happensin cases of approval.

All European countries have criteria and proce-dures for the formal approval of higher educationinstitutions, programmes or courses. In many cases,such approval will follow automatically from once-given rights that established institutions enjoy,whereas a specific qualifying process may be re-quired in other cases. National policy on approvalvaries considerably from one country to another.For such approval procedures – where they exist –to come under the “accreditation” category, onewould expect that the process is:

• systematic, all-inclusive and explicit.• based on academic criteria only, that is, removed

from political influence.

If these conditions are met, accreditation and ap-proval overlap completely and the term “accredita-tion” is usually preferred. Few countries in West-ern Europe have as yet introduced such explicitaccreditation schemes, at least not for the univer-sity sector.

When, on the other hand, decisions on approvalinclude considerations based on, for example, edu-cational needs, such as dimensioning, disciplinedevelopment or geographical distribution, the ac-creditation function becomes mixed with the exer-cise of political steering: There is still an identifi-able accrediting function at work, but it is more orless “hidden” inside a wider procedure. “Approval”would then be the preferred term.

A special type of accreditation has no connec-tion with official approval or degree-conferringrights at all: when a private association accreditseducational units according to its own quality stand-ards, it issues a quality stamp, not an official ap-proval (see 2.3).

2.2 Accreditation andevaluation

Accreditation is not the same as evaluation, al-though accreditation involves evaluating proceduresand evaluations may (or may not) have an accredit-ing function. Whereas accreditation has a very lim-ited objective (the yes–no verdict), evaluations usu-ally have a broad set of purposes (for example,SWOT-analysis, goal oriented, fitness for purpose,quality enhancement, organisational learning, stra-tegic recommendations). Whereas accreditation al-ways refers to a standard, evaluations may or maynot, or only partly. It is important to keep these dif-ferences in mind when evaluations are given ac-crediting functions.

When looking at the accreditation process, ac-creditation usually mingles with evaluation.

Both evaluation and accreditation include thesame methodological key elements:

• an independent undertaking of the investigation(normally manifested in an agency independentfrom universities and ministries)

• internal self-evaluation• external review or evaluation by experts• a site visit• a public report/public register

The unofficial, or private, type of accreditationmentioned above is typically an evaluation processwith the single aim of deciding whether the unit inquestion will be accredited or not. “Evaluation” and“accreditation” would here seem to overlap.

With official accreditation (or approval), there isusually a similar relationship, although it is lessclear: The different systematic evaluations that na-tional quality assurance agencies carry out span acontinuum ranging from an explicit accreditingfunction to little or no impact on accreditation atall. In one country, the agency’s evaluations maybe formally invested with a clear and undividedaccrediting mission, while in another the accredit-ing power may be retained as a function of govern-ment (as “approval”), whose decisions are, in turn,informed by the evaluations. In still other countries,evaluations may have no systematic accreditationfunction at all.

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2.3 Accreditation in practice

Accreditation can play a more or less dominant rolein the field of different measures that aim at moni-toring, steering, recognising and quality assuringhigher education. But as pointed out earlier, accredi-tation can, by no means, be reduced to one simplefunction, or one standard procedure. Accreditationis performed by government/ministries, official ac-crediting agencies, private organisations, associa-tions of institutions and professional associations,with differing authority and objectives. The best wayof broadening our understanding of the concept,beyond basic definitions, may be to map variouspractical functions of accreditation inside the fieldof higher education and the way in which these maybe carried out. The following dichotomies may helpto clarify these functions.

Official vs. private accreditation

National authorities of quality assurance, either theMinistry itself or a quality assurance agency, makeformal judgements on the approval/accreditation ofprogrammes or institutions, basing their rulings onset standards for awards and diplomas. Private or-ganisations with academic legitimacy (for exampleEQUIS), on the other hand, accredit institutions,faculties and programmes – often in several coun-tries – according to certain threshold levels whichthey themselves define. Such “certifying” or “clas-sification” procedures may help define cross-na-tional standards, but they are essentially private andvoluntary. Private accreditation may enhance aunit’s reputation, but it does not alter its formal sta-tus inside a nation’s higher education system. Ofthese two categories, official accreditation is the onethat concerns us in this report.

Accreditation by government vs.delegated arrangements

In all Nordic countries, the official approval ofhigher education rests on a national authority overdegrees and diplomas, rooted in legislation and ul-timately a function of government. But ministriesface two big problems in exercising this accredit-ing power: for one thing, they are more equipped

for steering educational policies than for makingacademic quality assessments and they must, there-fore, rely heavily on informed judgements fromoutside experts. The other problem concerns legiti-macy and transparency, as approval (or accredita-tion) by governmental decision conflicts with es-tablished ideals of academic objectivity and insti-tutional autonomy. Over the last ten or fifteen years,there has been a tendency for governments to del-egate an important role in the accrediting/approvalprocess to an agency that operates “at arm’s length”from political authorities. Normally, such delega-tion takes one of four forms:

• An independent quality assurance agency withfull accrediting authority may be established. Thiswould happen through legislation, transferringthe State’s accrediting powers formally to the out-side agency. This is usually also an evaluationagency. Such explicit transfer of the accreditingpower from government to a national agency isstill rare.

• An independent (or semi-independent) qualityassurance agency with an advisory function maybe established, in which case the government re-tains the right to have the last word in licensingmatters, basing its decisions on assessments andadvice from the agency. With minor individualvariations, this is the current arrangement in theNordic countries.

• Where a national agency under the State is lack-ing, an association of higher education institu-tions may exercise national quality assurancefunctions. In Europe, these functions will hardlyinclude accreditation powers, although this is not,theoretically, unthinkable2 . In any case, such for-mal powers would have to be considered as del-egated from the State. The general trend, though,has been a shift from early systems of qualityassurance with roots in the institutions themselvesto systems operated by national agencies set upthrough legislation.

2 In the USA and Canada, where no accreditation with rootsin government takes place, such associations – along withprofessional associations – perform the only recognisedaccreditations.

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• Even individual institutions may exercise ac-creditation powers, both through their right torecognise education from other institutions as in-tegrated in their own awards and diplomas andthrough the right to offer programmes and courseswithout any specific process of recognition3 . For-mally, though, such “self-accrediting” powers arealso delegated.

Institutional vs. subject/programme

An important issue in relation to accreditation isthe question of what level it should be directed at.The answer to that question is usually institutions,educational programmes or both. Other potentialtargets could be degrees or subjects.

The focus in programme accreditation is onwhether or not the quality of a programme meets acertain standard. The purpose is to provide the pub-lic (potential students, financial bodies and poten-tial partners) with a guarantee that a specific pro-gramme has gone through a process of quality as-surance and that it has been found to hold an ac-ceptable quality standard. Assessments conductedin connection with programme accreditation mayinclude some or all of the following themes: thepurpose and aim of the programme, its general de-sign and content, administrative and physical in-frastructure, the competence of the teaching staff,the student body, including recruitment profile, in-ternationalisation, etc. A more detailed set of crite-ria (indicators) would be set for each of these as-pects.

Institutional accreditation focuses on the institu-tion as a whole organisation. The purpose of insti-tutional accreditation is to ensure that there is asound organisational foundation for the educationalactivities. Institutional accreditation may includesome or all of the following themes: the appropri-ateness of mission and aims statements, steering andmanagement, administrative efficiency, financialresources and allocation systems, student and staffrecruitment policies, staff competencies, appropri-

ate learning resources/support, internal quality as-surance system, as well as research activity andeducational outcomes. Institutional accreditationmay also be carried out through the narrowermethod of institutional quality audit, which focusesspecifically on the institution’s internal quality as-surance systems and its indicators of educationalquality. Accreditation would then demand robustinternal quality assurance procedures, as the ac-countability of individual programmes would relyindirectly on this.

Initial vs. follow-up

If accreditation procedures are directed towards theprogramme level, there will usually be a differencebetween the kind of accrediting process that pre-cedes the launching of a new programme (ex ante)and the accreditation control that is exercised to-wards established ones (ex post). The latter is oftencarried out in connection with ordinary (cyclical)evaluations, whereas the former, where it exists4 ,tends to have a lighter touch: the matter may bedecided administratively in the Ministry or by thedecision of an accrediting agency, according to setcriteria and after advice from a group of experts.

Institutional accreditation is most likely to be ofthe initial type, as the prospect of “disqualifying”whole existing institutions would be an unlikelyevent in any case. Although it is still a relativelyrare phenomenon, it is not unlikely that institutionalaccreditation will become more common in a morederegulated higher education sector in the future.For example:

• In countries where legislation on higher educa-tion recognises different categories of institutions– with different degree-awarding powers, the pos-sibility of transfer from one category to another(from “college” to “university”) would require akind of accreditation process, which would sharemany characteristics with a full-scale evaluation.Such re-categorisation procedures have recently

3 With certain restrictions, for example, Norwegian universitiesand state colleges can freely open new programmes of up to 90credits (1.5 years) inside subject areas that are already wellestablished at the institution.

4 In some countries, institutions can set up new courses withoutany initial recognition process; in others, the government (orthe quality assurance agency) will regulate this through aprocess of quality assurance/recognition.

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been carried out in Sweden, and are currently be-ing discussed in Norway.

• In accordance with aims stated by the EuropeanCommission, private institutions might be giventhe right to achieve a more equal position con-cerning degree-awarding powers by letting themundergo a process of institutional accreditation.

• With a high degree of deregulation of the highereducation sector, institutional accreditation mayalso become a more common procedure in Stateinstitutions. A recent report on reforms in highereducation in Norway recommended that evenState institutions become legal subjects in theirown right. The Government, however, has de-clined to follow up this proposal.

Contrary to programme accreditation, a systematicapproach to institutional accreditation would prob-ably have its “heaviest” evaluating procedures oninitial accreditation, whereas the follow-up of al-ready accredited institutions might be done throughsome kind of audit of the internal quality assurancesystem.

2.4 Limits of accreditation

Accreditation does not prohibit the delivery ofunaccredited courses or the establishment ofunaccredited institutions; nor does it prohibit theuse of the terms “higher education” about suchcourses or even “university” about such institutions,as these terms are not legally protected in mostcountries.

Accreditation does not automatically secure pub-lic funding. Whereas decisions on accreditation arebased on set quality standards and are supposed tobe objective, the funding authority is a strictly po-litical one and rests with the government, on whosediscretion accredited courses may be funded or not.However, it is the firm practice in most countriesthat only accredited (or “approved”) courses willreceive public money. Typically, this is the mostimportant practical implication of accreditation.

Accreditation, as such, does not include the rightto practice certain regulated professions, as criteria

for such decisions are made by the employing au-thority. However, an accredited (or “approved”)academic programme is normally a prerequisite forsuch a right.

2.5 Critical points ofaccreditation

Accreditation is closely entwined with the conceptof quality. Accreditation and quality should be tar-geted at those issues, which are considered impor-tant from the point of view of the basic task of uni-versities. It is often difficult, however, to reach anagreement about the definition of quality. A Finn-ish interview research (Sohlo 2000) surveying thenotions of university rectors of good quality, illus-trates this aptly: the conclusion was that, on a gen-eral level, it is next to impossible to define quality.This is quite obvious when we think of the differ-ent missions of, for example, broadly-based uni-versities, schools of economics and business admin-istration as well as art academies.

Accountability

A main purpose of institutional accreditation, as wellas programme accreditation, is accountability or,phrased differently, the creation of a “window in tohigher education institution”. A major advantage ofprogramme accreditation is that it provides a highdegree of accountability, because it is clear to thestakeholders which criteria apply to a programme.Institutional accreditation certifies, in the same way,that the institution fulfils certain criteria. However,this does not provide any information about thequality of the specific programmes.

The key question, in terms of accountability inrelation to institutional accreditation, is whether ornot it is possible to create internal quality assur-ance procedures that make the public confident inthe quality of that programme. In terms of account-ability, this would require transparency in the inter-nal quality assurance procedures.

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Problem of focus

One of the problems is whether the focus is on theright issues. The theoretical basis for accreditationand evaluations can be questioned. It is rather diffi-cult to explain what makes teaching effective, orwhat the critical points are in the operations of theorganisation, which would support learning. Theselection of foci is often based on the contempla-tion of experts rather than theories on human learn-ing. Learning results are, thus, essential and weshould avoid concentrating solely on how these re-sults were reached. For example, traditional accredi-tation fails with regard to the different virtual teach-ing arrangements.

Different educational systems in different coun-tries present obstacles to international accreditationco-operation. Moreover, the relationship betweenthe regional role of universities and national andinternational criteria should be discussed. Whichperspective should be stressed most? The impor-tance of a university as a regional flagship or theinternational correspondence between degrees?

Obstacle to development

One of the intrinsic problems of accreditation is thatby setting standards a certain level is guaranteed,but, at the same time, it may become difficult foran innovative programme or institution to fulfil thestandards, either because the standards are not au-tomatically set at the front level, or because the pro-gramme operates on the borders of a discipline. Asimilar problem is that accreditation can have anunintended and unwanted harmonising function.These problems are partly related to the questionof how detailed the accreditation criteria should be.The more detailed criteria the less scope for inno-vative and developing programmes.

At its worst, accreditation may turn out to be aconservative system, which underpins the existingprocedures so that it is ‘easiest’ to establish criteriathat the majority of experts agree upon. Thus, ideasoutside the mainstream, as well as new educationand training experiments, may face difficulties.New, cross-disciplinary programmes, which cannotbe classified as belonging to any individual disci-

pline, are likely to pose problems in a subject-basedaccreditation scheme. Furthermore, it is worth pon-dering whether the same accreditation models suitall disciplines.

Costly arrangement

Accreditation must be repeated in a cycle (for in-stance, every 5–10 years) to ensure that quality con-tinues to meet the defined standard. For multi-fac-ulty universities, this means that there could be alarge number of programmes in an accreditationcycle. The burden on the institutions could be light-ened by institutional accreditation. The key ques-tion, in this regard, is whether it is possible to cre-ate internal quality assurance procedures that makethe public confident in the quality of that pro-gramme. When setting up an accreditation system,it is crucial that it adds value to the educational sys-tem, which means that it provides more benefits thanit costs.

It could be argued that programme accreditationand institutional accreditation must be combined toensure the highest degree of accountability. Thiswould give the benefits of both approaches in termsof accountability, because it would certify that theinstitution, as well as programmes provided by theinstitution, is at a certain level. However, in termsof promoting quality and cost efficiency, the com-bined approach is more ambiguous. It holds thesame problems as programme accreditation in re-lation to development, and it is more costly than anapproach based on programme accreditation alone.One option to be considered is a combined approachin which the follow-up accreditation at the pro-gramme level is conducted with a lighter touch, thatis, accreditations primarily based on reports fromthe internal quality systems on the institutions.

Insufficient evidence of quality

When implementing accreditation, we must discusswhat is sufficient proof of the level of a particularoperation. Is self-evaluation data sufficiently sup-plemented by interviews? Which would be the bestway to gather information about the level of teach-ing and learning results? Would assessment of the-

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ses be enough? What are the available criteria ifthe goals of different programmes vary from eachother? The selection of the accreditation criteria isalso a question of power: do institutions of highereducation decide on the criteria, or should repre-sentatives from working life have an opportunity

to participate in the decision-making? What is therole of the financiers and the State? Should students’opinions be taken into account? In short, the selec-tion of elements to be accredited, and the criteria,should encompass the needs and views of the vari-ous stakeholders.

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There is certainly more than one explanation as towhy accreditation has become a central issue inEurope (as well as in the USA). At least, there seemsto be several structural and historical explanationsfor the demand of accreditation of higher educa-tion in Europe today.

3.1 Trust and accountability

The demand for accountability and trust was raisedon the political agenda, parallel with the develop-ment of decentralisation and greater freedom foruniversities to take decisions at their own discre-tion. How do politicians, government, parliament,citizens or students know that the higher educationinstitutions provide a good education? One tool forgovernments to control, and even support, the qual-ity of the work performed by the higher educationinstitutions has been to implement different kindsof evaluation and accreditation procedures.

As the universities in the Nordic countries be-long to the public sector, this development can beregarded as a part of a broader development towardsa new mode of controlling public organisations. Thekey issues in those reforms in the public sector weredecentralisation of decision-making, (economic)incentive structures for units and personnel, outputcontrol and a business-type management. Thesechanges in the doctrine concerning the managementof public institutions developed at different stagesin the OECD countries in the 1980s. This mode hasbeen labelled New Public Management (NPM)(Hood 1991). The Higher Education reform in Swe-den, 1993, is often regarded as a reform of highereducation (Askling and Bauer 2000). But it couldalso be looked upon as a public administration re-form with NPM connotations. Self-regulation, au-tonomy and a funding system based on output meas-urement were some of the main ingredients in thereform. As a consequence of the increased autonomy

and self-regulation, the Government stressed theneed for evaluations and accreditation of universi-ties and university colleges.

The author of the book, The Audit Society, Ritu-als of Verification, Michael Power (1999), is con-vinced that we are in the middle of a huge and una-voidable social experiment, which is conspicuouslycross-sectional and trans-national. This trend affectsboth the private and public sectors. According toPower, the audit society started to develop duringthe 1980s. Key words in the development for con-trolling sectors and organisations were a) decen-tralisation, b) management by objectives, c) empow-erment of local leadership, d) evaluation and ac-countability. The accounting systems in organisa-tions, private or public, became one of the maintools for the leaders and politicians to control theefficiency and output of the work.

The foundation of bodies for accreditation andcertification, with the task to verify standards, ispart of the development of the audit society. This isseen as a reaction to the deregulation of the publicsector. Accreditation and standardisation are toolsto make a differentiated and complex environmentmore easy and transparent. Information and co-or-dination will contribute to an overview of the fieldfor different groups, such as students, parents, teach-ers and employers. It is a reaction to the develop-ment of the modern risk society (Sahlin-Anderssonand Hedmo, 2000).

3.2 A common labour marketand student mobilityrequirements

The second explanation is the European conver-gence process, which has put accreditation firmlyon the European higher education agenda, particu-larly since the Bologna Declaration singled out the

3 Why Has Accreditation Becomea Central Issue?

15


development of an ECTS-compatible credit system(the European Credit Transfer System) and “a Eu-ropean dimension” in quality assurance as specificobjectives. The Bologna Declaration has created agrowing awareness that national quality assurancesystems need to have concrete outcomes in termsof the legibility and comparability of degrees. (Haugand Tauch 2001)

The Bologna Declaration started an intense dis-cussion immediately it was released. The focus ofEuropean higher education shifted to the ‘new struc-ture’ of higher education. It raised the question ofthe equivalence of a Bachelor’s/Master’s degree ina certain discipline in one country with the samedegree in the same discipline in another country.One main topic here is the development of theECTS, which will make it easier for students tomove between universities and countries.

A common labour market, with some hundredsof millions of people, will not be efficient withouta common or transparent higher education system.As higher education in Europe comprises many dif-ferent national systems with a high degree of dif-ferentiation, the requirements for accreditation haveappeared on the European agenda (Kälvemark2001).

From the students’ point of view, the followinglist describes some of the reasons why accredita-tion has become a central issue in Europe, in thelate 1990s.

1. Due to an increasing student mobility in Europe,there is a need to recognise good quality institu-tions and acknowledge their studies for credittransferring purposes.

2. Need to protect the “consumers” (students as wellas employers) of education against low qualityprogrammes (information needs of students)

3. Creation of international labour markets has cre-ated a need to recruit internationally and informemployers about the level of employees’ (stu-dents’) education.

3.3 Borderless marketsfor higher education

The third explanation for the attention to accredita-tion can be the development of global non-nationalhigher education providers, so-called new private for-profit, virtual, and corporate, providers in the do-mestic and international markets for higher educa-tion. The Business of Borderless Education has beena label for such ”universities”. The term ‘border-less higher education’ (coined in Australia) is usedextensively to indicate the development of organi-sations crossing the traditional borders of highereducation, whether geographical or conceptual.

There was an intensified development of accredi-tation during the 1990s in various European coun-tries. This trend is parallel with the rapid growth ininternational and trans-national organisations afterthe Second World War. Especially, the so calledInternational non-governmental organisations,(INGOs), have increased dramatically. Even the so-called IGOs, Intergovernmental organisations, haveincreased in number.

It may be in the interest of national governmentsto protect their own institutions from competitionfrom such companies selling education of an opaquequality, and leading to different kinds of unrecog-nised diplomas. It may also be in the interest ofnational governments that students can make a goodand safe choice of study programmes and institu-tions. One way of doing this is to run State-com-missioned accreditation activities for institutions orstudy programmes.

There is also a parallel driving force for differ-ent providers of higher education, on the globalmarket, to be an accredited institution. One clearexample of this is the development of accreditationof Master of Business Administration (MBA). MBAis a nearly one hundred year old American educa-tion in management. The first American MBA pro-gramme started 1902 at Amos Tuck School, Dart-mouth College, New Hampshire, USA. Today, thereare around 1,250 programmes around the world,

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about 400 of which are in Europe. As MBA pro-grammes have proliferated in Europe, different sys-tems of standards, external evaluations, ranking andaccreditation procedures have developed.

3.4 The proliferation ofaccreditation systems:from USA to Europe

Accreditation is not a new phenomenon in the fieldof higher education. For example, in the UnitedStates, different accreditation systems have alreadyexisted for almost a century. The basis for creatinga system for accreditation is based on the need todefine the minimum standards for higher educationestablishments. The number of institutions in theUSA offering programmes in higher education isclose to 3,500. Accreditation has been used as a toolfor selecting those institutions, whose quality ofeducation is at an ‘adequate’ level and for choosingthe ones eligible for public funding.

In the USA, accreditation is organised and certi-fied by associations, for example, of universities ortheir departments. The accreditation work is per-formed by many different, non-governmental or-ganisations. It concerns institutions, programmesand degrees. It is implemented on a voluntary ba-sis, but is needed for public funds and grants as wellas for the competition for students and staff. It is acollegial process based on self- and peer-assessmentfor improvement of academic quality and publicaccountability.

In Europe, the oldest tradition of accreditation-like quality assurance is in England. The traditionof auditing the quality systems and assessment ofeducation programmes also has a long history. Insome Central Eastern European countries, for ex-ample, Hungary, the minimum requirements (crite-ria) for the educational programmes have been as-sured through accreditation, since the beginning ofthe 1990s.

One of the ‘newcomers’ in this field is Germany.It decided in 1998 to start to accredit the graduatedegrees in higher education. The Conference ofMinisters of Culture and the Rectors’ Conferencehave established an Accreditation Council affiliated

to the Rectors’ Conference, which is responsible forthe accreditation of newly-established Bachelor andMaster Programmes of Universities and Polytech-nics (Fachhochschulen). It aims to set commonstandards especially for those programmes, whichhave not earlier been under a national approval sys-tem (to award degrees).

Austria and The Netherlands have also started todevelop accreditation systems for their own nationaleducation. In Austria, legislation was passed to es-tablish an Accreditation Council to accredit privateinstitutions of higher education, thus, authorisingan institution to call itself “Privatuniversität”, awardofficial academic degrees as well as giving the aca-demic staff the right to use the title of the univer-sity system. In the Netherlands, accreditation willbe compulsory for all degree programmes of gov-ernment-funded or approved private institutions.Accreditation will be a condition for funding andfor granting titles and certificates.

3.5 Trans-nationalaccreditation systems

Traditionally, each country is responsible for ac-crediting its own educational institutions and sys-tems in general. The multiplicity of programmesand institutions has created a system with a varietyof bilateral and multilateral agreements with Euro-pean institutions of higher education recognisinganother’s study programmes and non-Europeanaccreditation organisations of the professions(mainly business and engineering). During the lastdecade, the internationalisation of education hastriggered, to some extend, a need to develop inter-national accreditation systems and/or agreements.Institutions try, for example, to obtain internationalrecognition by calling in a foreign quality assess-ment authority for an external programme reviewor by co-operating with foreign institutions.

A good example is EQUIS (European QualityImprovement System) developed by the efmd (Eu-ropean Foundation for Management Development)to provide a framework for accrediting managementeducation institutions across Europe and boostingtheir continuous improvement. Participation in the

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system is on a voluntary basis. Moreover, the As-sociation of European Universities – CRE has rec-ognised the need for a wider opportunity to clarifythe concepts linked to accreditation. The Associa-tion received funding from the EU last year (year2000) to promote the project.

The European accreditation systems face increas-ing competition from abroad. Especially, the Ameri-can accreditation organisations are actively sellingtheir services to European institutions. For exam-ple, in the field of technology, some of the CentralEuropean universities have received an Americanaccreditation. It is quite natural to think that Euro-peans should have their own accreditation systemsand not to yield their position and authority to others.

There has been competition between the organi-sations for accreditation of the MBA in the USA(AACSB) and the European one (emfd). To keepits position in Europe as the co-ordinator of the dis-

cussion concerning management programmes, theemfd felt it important to compete with the ASCSB.With support from the EU, the European version ofaccreditation has been developed. Many universi-ties in Europe have labelled their management pro-grammes, MBA, in order to compete with otherinstitutions. In the long run, it might be importantto be accredited by the emfd in order to competefor students. The accreditation of the MBA pro-grammes in Europe has lead to standardisation andvariation of the programmes in different institutions.A prestigious institution will be able to offer anMBA programme. The label will be easily recog-nised by students and employers. But, at the sametime, institutions are shaping the programmes intheir own way, thus leading to a vast variation inMBA programme content (Sahlin-Andersson andHedmo 2000).

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4.1 Denmark

In Denmark, the system of higher education is ad-ministered centrally by the Ministry of Education’sDepartment of Higher Education. Only certain pro-grammes within such fields as art, architecture, li-brarianship and marine engineering are placed un-der other ministries (Danish Ministry of Education1996). The system is mainly financed by the Stateand tuition is free of charge for the students.

Higher education in Denmark is characterised bya binary structure, based on a separation of the non-university sector, that is the vocationally-orientedprogrammes and the university sector. The non-university sector offers short-cycle higher educa-tion and medium-cycle higher education, and theuniversity sector offers long-cycle higher educationprogrammes. Each category will be further dis-cussed below.

For a small country, Denmark has succeeded inbuilding up a remarkably complex and differenti-ated educational system. In higher education, thisis evidenced, especially, in the non-university sec-tor, where a large number of institutions offer studyprogrammes of varying lengths and levels: the short-cycle higher education area includes 70 institutions,the medium-cycle higher education area 112 insti-tutions, and the long-cycle higher education insti-tutions area includes 11 institutions. In addition, theMinistry of Cultural Affairs administers 21 schools,which are either medium-cycle or long-cycle highereducation institutions.

The gross intake to higher education, in general,is 56% of a year group. Of these 9% are in the short-cycle, 38% in the medium-cycle and 53% in thelong-cycle higher education programmes. Approxi-mately 40% of a year group completes a degree(Ministry of Education 2000:30). It is the statedGovernment policy that 50% of a year group ob-tain a higher education degree.

The size of the student intake is an institutionaldecision based on the available resources and thephysical framework. The admission requirementsare, however, set by the Ministry of Education. Theyare normally based on the examination result ob-tained at the end of upper secondary education, insome cases supplemented with points obtained foroccupational experience, etc.

Accreditation procedures

The Danish Evaluation Institute is responsible forthe systematic evaluation of the whole educationalsector, higher education included. Accreditation ison of the evaluation methods covered by the legalframework of the Institute. However, accreditationprocedures are not widely used in Denmark. Theonly example of accreditation is in relation to theapproval of the Danish State grant for students ofprivate courses normally at the short cycle highereducation level and further education level (in Dan-ish “SU-vurderinger”). These accreditations are partof the Ministry of Education’s procedure to deter-mine whether students at private teaching establish-ments should receive the Danish State grant. TheDanish Evaluation Institute conducts the accred-itations, while the Ministry of Education is the ap-proval authority on the basis of the accreditations.The Ministry of Education approves the grant for aperiod of no more than four years after which theinstitutions must be re-accredited. The accredita-tion framework consists of more than forty criteriaformulated within thirteen areas. Criteria are estab-lished for purpose and content, labour market per-spective and competence, educational structure,exams, enrolment of students, staffing, organisation,economy, study facilities and internal quality as-surance. However, all of these criteria do not nec-essarily have to be met. The programme provider

4 Quality assurance and accreditation-like practices in higher education

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must, nevertheless, demonstrate that the majorityof the criteria are fulfilled in a substantial way.

The accreditation model consist of three ele-ments:

1. A self-study. The self-study must be conductedby the institution under scrutiny according to amanual provided by the Danish Evaluation In-stitute. In the self-study, it is the institution’s re-sponsibility to prove that it meets the criteria orthe vast majority of them. The purpose of the self-study is to provide qualitative and quantitativedocumentation for the accreditation.

2. A labour market survey. The survey is conductedby Statistics Denmark. The purpose of the sur-vey is to establish that the former students havea relevant occupation.

3. A site visit. The visit is of a one-day duration.The aim is to validate the self-study and to ob-serve the study facilities. The visit includes meet-ing with the management, students, staff and ex-ternal examiners.

The general model for quality assurance ofhigher education

The vast majority of higher education in Denmarkis State financed and State regulated. Accreditationis not used in this area. The quality of higher edu-cation is assured by a system of ministerial approvalof new programmes and institutions, external ex-aminers and an evaluation system. There are, how-ever, considerations about accreditation partly ini-tiated by the Bologna process. These considerationsinvolve the Ministry of Education, the Rectors’Conference and the Danish Evaluation Institute.

Ministerial orders

The Ministry of Education approves all new pro-grammes as well as institutions. Neither universi-ties nor other higher education institutions are al-lowed to provide any programme without a minis-terial order. There is no systematic pre-test of pro-grammes, but there is a hearing of the relevant edu-cational council.

Traditionally, new institutions have been estab-lished ad hoc. However, with the institutional re-form of the medium cycle higher education sector

passed by Parliament in 2000, the Ministry has es-tablished a procedure for the recognition of merg-ers and individual institutions as Centres for HigherEducation. The recognition is subject to legal ap-proval by the Minister. The recognition takes intoconsideration conditions like intake, staff, educa-tional profile, co-operation with university-levelinstitution, employability, management and regionalfactors

External examiners

There is an extensive use of external examiners inDenmark compared with most other countries. Ex-ternal examiners are used in a majority of examsand other assessments in higher education through-out the period of study. It is the responsibility ofthe external examiners to ensure that the exams andother assessments (oral as well as written) are con-ducted according to regulations including the min-isterial order on the specific programme. Externalexaminers must also ensure that the students aretreated fair and equal. Finally, the external exam-iner must give the institution feed-back on qualityissues.

Evaluation

Since 1992, the Danish Evaluation Institute and itspredecessor, the Centre for Evaluation and QualityAssurance of Higher Education, have completed acycle of programme evaluations of almost all of theprogrammes in Denmark. The basic model for thishas been a fitness-for-purpose approach includinginternal self-evaluation, an external expert team, auser survey and a site visit. It is the Institute thatdecides what system of evaluation will follow theprogramme evaluations. The first years of opera-tion will be spent conducting a number of pilot stud-ies testing various methods. These pilots will formthe basis for future decisions as to how higher edu-cation will be systematically evaluated. In 2001, theDanish Evaluation Institute has scheduled a facultyevaluation and there are considerations concerningthe employment of a framework for quality as analternative to the fitness-for-purpose approach.

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4.2 Finland

The Finnish higher education system consists of twosectors: there are altogether 20 universities and 29polytechnics in Finland. The higher education sys-tem, as a whole, offers openings for 66% of the rel-evant age group (universities 29%, polytechnics37%).

In the university sector, there are ten multi-fac-ulty universities, three universities of technology,three schools of economics and business adminis-tration, and four art academies. Geographically, thenetwork covers the whole country. University-leveleducation is also provided by the National DefenceCollege, which comes under the Ministry of De-fence.

The basic mission of universities is to carry outresearch and provide education based on it. Theunderlying principle in university education is thefreedom of research and university autonomy, whichgives them extensive latitude for independent deci-sions. All Finnish universities are State-run, withthe Government providing some 70% of their fund-ing. Each university and the Ministry of Educationconclude a three-year agreement on target outcometo determine the operational principles. The mostimportant legislation governing the universities arethe Universities Act and Decree, the Decree on theHigher Education Degree System and field-specificDecrees, which lay down such things as the respon-sibility for education in a given discipline, degreetitles, and the structure, extent, objectives and con-tent of education.

Universities select their own students, and thecompetition for openings is stiff. All fields applynumerus clausus, in which entrance examinationsare a key element. Universities offer openings forabout one third of the age group. The annual numberof applications is nearly 66,000, and only 23,000candidates are admitted. The aim is to offer a placein universities and polytechnics to 60–65% of theage group, which will be achieved soon.

The polytechnics were created gradually over the1990s in Finland. The standard of former highervocational education was raised and institutionsincorporated into multidisciplinary polytechnics.

The Polytechnics Act was passed in 1995. The na-tional polytechnics network is now complete. SinceAugust 1, 2000, all Finnish polytechnics operateon a permanent basis.

Most of the polytechnics are multidisciplinary,regional institutions, which give particular weightto contacts with business and industry. Furthermore,there are the Police College of Finland which is fi-nanced by the Ministry of the Interior, and ÅlandsYrkeshögskola Polytechnic, subordinate to theGovernment of the self-governing Åland Islands.

Finnish polytechnics, which are either munici-pal or private, are co-financed by the Governmentand the local authorities. The Ministry of Educa-tion and each polytechnic conclude a three-yearagreement on target outcome to determine the ob-jectives, intakes, and project and performance-basedfunding. There is no tuition fee for degree studies.In 1999, the total intake in polytechnics was littleover 24,000.

In Finland, the establishment of new higher edu-cation institutions is decided by the Council of Stateand recognised by law. The Government accreditsuniversities automatically when/if a decision ismade to establish one. Furthermore, a (professional)higher education institution can then offer recog-nised degrees to the students. In almost all cases, astudent does not need, after completing his/her stud-ies successfully, additional professional accredita-tion (or recognition) from a professional/special-ised body.

The aim of quality assurance inhigher education

In Finland, the evaluation of higher education is-sues is carried out by the Finnish Higher EducationEvaluation Council. It is an independent expert bodyassisting universities, polytechnics and the Minis-try of Education in matters relating to evaluation.The evaluation work is financed mostly by the Min-istry of Education and other sources are also uti-lised on a contract basis. The aims, and to someextent, the policies of the FINHEEC are based onthe decree regarding its work (1320/1995) The coun-cil was set up as an evaluation agency for the pur-pose of

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1. assisting institutions of higher education and theMinistry of Education in evaluation;

2. conducting evaluation for the accreditation of thepolytechnics

3. organising evaluations of the operations and poli-cies of institutions of higher education;

4. initiating evaluations of higher education and itsdevelopment;

5. engaging in international co-operation in evalu-ation

6. promoting research on evaluation of higher edu-cation.

The Higher Education Evaluation Council improvesthe quality of higher education through evaluationwork. The Evaluation Council publishes reports,issues statements and makes proposals. The im-provement of evaluation expertise in the highereducation institutions is also seen as an importantobjective. One of the longer-term targets in Finnishhigher education policy is to incorporate evalua-tion into the everyday routines of the institutions.

In 1998, an amending decree (465/1998) assignedthe Council the task of evaluating and recordingprofessional courses offered by institutions of highereducation. The decree had the impact of includingalso officially binding decisions to its work, whenthe Accreditation Board of Professional Courses (asubcommittee of the Council) became responsiblefor the accreditation of professional courses and thekeeping of a register of the accredited courses.

The introduction of accreditation into the highereducation sector in Finland is one element in qual-ity assurance systems. However, improvement andassessment of the quality of education is seen asmore important than accreditation. Two models, il-lustrating how the Finnish Higher Education Evalu-ation Council is involved in accreditation-like prac-tices, will be discussed in the text below.

Since 1996, the Finnish Higher Education Evalu-ation Council (FINHEEC) has assisted the Councilof State on accrediting issues, for example, whenestablishing (or accrediting) ‘new polytechnics’ orgranting extension of their operating licences.Moreover, since 1998, FINHEEC has been respon-sible for accrediting professional developmentcourses (continuing education).

Accreditation of the polytechnics

One of the tasks of the Finnish Higher EducationEvaluation Council has been to assist the Councilof State in the accreditation of the polytechnics. TheEvaluation Council evaluated applications made bythe polytechnics for accreditation and establishment.A separate Accreditation Subcommittee was estab-lished. The Members of the Accreditation Subcom-mittee consist of the representatives of polytech-nics, teachers working in the polytechnic, studentsand representatives of working life.

In 1995 and 1996, the accreditation and exten-sion of polytechnics were evaluated on the basis ofapplications. Since 1997, site visits have been addedto the procedure. The Accreditation Subcommitteehas compiled public reports of each evaluation and,since 1998, these reports have been published inthe publication series of the Evaluation Council.

Furthermore, the Accreditation Subcommitteehas implemented evaluations in case there has beena change in the scope of activities of an accreditedpolytechnic, or in the event new educational estab-lishments (former independent institutions) havebeen incorporated with it.

The criteria used in the accreditation of perma-nent polytechnics include mainly proven excellencein experimental and development work. The crite-ria were set by an independent adviser for the Min-istry of Education, who had developed the criteriain mutual discussions involving various partnersfrom the polytechnics, regional authorities, studentsand representatives of industry and commerce.

The following framework for criteria was usedin the assessment:

1. Mission, vision, goals and aims2. Curriculum design (up-to-date, programme

diversity and co-operation etc.)3. Strength of the operational plan4. Adequate student volumes5. Teaching and learning6. Library and information services7. Co-operation with the working life8. Co-operation with other higher education

institutions

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9. International co-operation10. Regional purpose of the institution11. Quality assurance systems

The aim of forming the criteria was to agree onminimum standards for permanent polytechnics.

Accreditation of professional courses

The evaluation and accreditation of professionalcourses has been on the agenda in Finland since1996. At that time, the Minister of Education hadto publicly assume responsibility for the invalidqualifications offered by a Continuing EducationCentre of a certain university. In 1998, the FinnishHigher Education Evaluation Council was assignedthe task of registering professional courses. TheEvaluation Council appointed a subsection, theAccreditation Board of Professional Courses(ABPC), whose task was to assess professionalcourses and decide on accreditation. The Boardconsists of 12 members representing universities,polytechnics, working life and students.

The term ‘Accreditation of Professional Courses’is commonly used. The law defines the practiceas ‘Evaluation and registration of professionalcourses’. Accreditation of professional courses is aprocess that gives public recognition or registrationto professional, non-degree courses that meet cer-tain (adequate quality) standards. It is a ‘promise’that the course will provide the quality of educa-tion it claims to offer. Accreditation assures the stu-dent that the course is offered on a sound basis. It isimportant to note that the institutions themselvesapply accreditation for the professional courses ona voluntary basis.

During its two-year term of operation, the Ac-creditation Board of Professional Courses hasadopted the role of advisor and developer in highereducation matters. It has rejected the role of con-troller, which, at first, seems inevitably to followfrom keeping an official accreditation register. Inthe first two years of operation, 49 courses havebeen evaluated, 33 of which have been acceptedand registered as meeting the sufficient quality. Theaim of the accreditation is to credit the programmeson the basis of their capacity to deliver good qual-

ity educational services and not just meeting theminimum standards.

When accrediting the Professional Courses, theAccreditation Board of Professional Courses(ABPC) is responsible for setting the criteria forgood practices. During a site-visit to the course or-ganiser, the following aspects are analysed:

1. Basic requirements2. Co-operation with the working life3. Course content and objectives4. Educational process5. Educational arrangements6. Practical arrangements7. Quality assurance

Additional criteria are set for courses taught througha foreign language and for virtual courses.

It is up to the institution to look for the best wayto meet the criteria.

The accreditation process includes a review ofthe relevant documentation (application), a visit tothe course and the immediate feedback after the sitevisit. However, the final decision is made by a sub-committee. The decision is made on a yes/no (reg-istered/not registered) basis. Feedback and recom-mendations for the programme are provided afterthe registration decision is made.

International accreditation

The Finnish Higher Education Evaluation Councilalso carries out institutional evaluations. The ma-jority of evaluations have been in the form of co-operation between the higher education institutionsand the FINHEEC. In two projects, the evaluations(accreditation) have also involved a foreign co-op-eration partner. With financial support from theCouncil, EQUIS accreditations have been organ-ised by the European Foundation for ManagementDevelopment in two universities of business andadministration. Some polytechnics have independ-ently acquired, for example, international accredi-tation for their quality systems (by Norske Veritas).The European Foundation for the Accreditation ofHotel School Programmes has accredited (recog-nised) Bachelor of Science degree programmes inHotel, Restaurant & Tourism Management in onepolytechnic in the field.

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Discussion on the Finnish experience

Quality assurance agencies in higher educationmushroom around Europe. FINHEEC has beenoperating since 1996 and is already considered a“middle-aged” evaluation agency in Nordic andEuropean comparison. From the beginning, the aimof the FINHEEC’s evaluation has been empower-ment of educational institutions rather than control.The purpose of accreditation-like practices andevaluation in Finland has been to improve learn-ing, teaching methods, the processes of providingtransparent information and practices within highereducation institutions.

The institutions themselves participate activelyin the process of evaluation. It is seen as importantthat the higher education institutions themselves areresponsible for quality. When the institutions caninfluence the choice of objects, aims, methods, andcriteria for evaluation, they can gain ownership ofevaluation. Even when accrediting the professionalcourses, the site visit is designed to be participativeand constructive (Hämäläinen & Kauppi, 2000).When the professional courses are being accred-ited, criteria are set by an outside body. If the coursefails to meet the criteria, the institute may continueto run the course, but, as often is the case, it leadsto immediate further self-development and improve-ment.

Accreditation of professional courses is volun-tary for the higher education institutions. Often, theinstitutions apply with their best courses. The sta-tus of becoming accredited is not as significant. Theresult, if favourable, is sometimes used for market-ing purposes. In unfavourable cases, the process isseen as a valuable tool for obtaining an outside viewof the course or institute. Increasingly often, stu-dents are asking the organiser of the course to par-ticipate in accreditation.

One of the quality assurance mechanisms in Fin-land, as well as Sweden, has been the audit of qual-ity work. The focus is not on ‘quality’ but on ‘qual-ity work’: how an institution satisfies itself that itschosen academic standards are being achieved. Thisis inherently simpler and less expensive to conductthan institutional accreditations. There is a grow-ing realisation to support the view that the focus of

an academic audit on improvement and institutionalquality assurance processes may be a more appro-priate means of accountability given the evolutionof polytechnics (and universities) throughout theworld into self-regulatory ‘learning organisations’(Dill 1999). There is an increasing interest in aca-demic audit and its orientation towards improvingacademic quality assurance processes within highereducation institutions.

Follow-up procedures have been developed forthe accreditation of polytechnics. When grantingthe operating licences, some of the polytechnicswere given (at the time of granting a permanent li-cence) a recommendation to develop some assessedareas within a fixed period of time, (usually 2 years).A follow-up site visit is then arranged.

The follow-up of the accreditation of professionalcourses is left to the organisers of the courses them-selves. They are obliged to report to the Board forProfessional Courses all substantive changes occur-ring after the registration.

Increasing interest in virtual learning, no doubt,sets new challenges for accreditation. The newly-established Finnish Virtual University and VirtualPolytechnic allow flexible delivery of educationinternationally. In this context, especially, the trans-fer of credits becomes important. This might callincreased attention to the need for some kind ofquality label for the content of the studies, or insti-tutions offering the courses, especially, if the courseis offered for an international group of students. Thecriteria for accrediting virtual courses would stillneed to be developed. So far, the criteria used forprofessional courses is also applied in virtualcourses.

4.3 Iceland

There are currently eight higher education institu-tions in Iceland, offering studies for degrees at uni-versity level. Five of these institutions are state-runand three are private institutions. Three of the insti-tutions offer graduate programmes for a master’sdegree but the University of Iceland is the only in-stitution that offers doctoral studies.

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All universities and institutions at university levelcome under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Edu-cation, Science and Culture, except the AgriculturalUniversity, which belongs to the Ministry of Agri-culture. A new framework law on the higher educa-tion was passed in December 1997. According tothe law, the general objectives of higher educationinstitutions are to serve as scientific research andeducational institutions, to provide students witheducation preparing them for working independ-ently in science, innovation and the arts and to fillthe various employment positions in society thatrequire higher education. Universities are also toeducate the public and to serve society through itsknowledge. More specified objectives are outlinedin individual laws for each higher education insti-tution.

The enactment of the law gives Icelandic uni-versities increased autonomy in their own matters,and has altered the relations between the highereducation institutions and the Ministry of Educa-tion, Science and Culture. The Ministry’s empha-sis is on agreements and monitoring, rather than oninterference with particular internal matters of theinstitutions.

Admission to most institutions of higher educa-tion is subject to matriculation from an Icelandicupper secondary school or equivalent education.Universities may set specific requirements as to pre-requisite specialization at the secondary level forsome programs of study. In the state-run universi-ties there is generally no ceiling on the number ofstudents admitted. However, in some programs thenumber of students allowed to continue after theend of the first term is limited, either by competi-tive examination at the end of the first year as inlaw or by numerus clausus as in subjects within thehealth sciences.

In the academic year 1999–2000, 10.283 studentswere enrolled in higher education institutions inIceland. The demand for university level educationin Iceland has increased significantly in the last fewyears and decades. From 1977 to 1998 the numberof university level students has increased nearlyfourfold.

Accreditation-like practices in Iceland

There is no formal accreditation system in Iceland.The Ministry of Education has several means tocheck the standards and quality of study pro-grammes offered by the higher education institu-tions. The universities are obliged, according to theLaw on Higher Education and regulation regardingquality control of university instruction, to set upan internal quality system, and the Ministry has theauthority to undertake an external evaluation ofdefined units within the institutions or the institu-tions as a whole. The Ministry can also influencethe standards through financial and performanceagreements that are made with each university. Fur-thermore, the Ministry is responsible for approvingnew degrees.

According to the Universities Act private partiesmay establish universities upon receiving the con-sent of the Minister of Education. The Minister ofEducation may grant operating permits to universi-ties funded by private parties if they operate in ac-cordance with statutes or charters ratified by theMinister of Education. Should a university, whichhas been granted an operation permit, fail to fulfilthe provisions of this Act or the demands made con-cerning instruction and research, the Minister ofEducation may revoke its operating permit.

As required by law and subject to review by theMinistry of Education, Science and Culture, uni-versity institutions are responsible for issuing cer-tificates and defining the content and method ofcourses leading to certification. The Ministry is alsoto issue a list of degrees and their content recog-nized by the Ministry.

International Accreditation

Some programmes have independently requestedan international accreditation. The Faculty of En-gineering at the University of Iceland was evalu-ated in 1992–1993 by the Accrediting Board forEngineering and Technology, Inc. (ABET), anAmerican engineering accrediting agency. The Min-istry of Culture and Education, the Ministry of In-dustry and Commerce, the Association of CharteredEngineers and the University of Iceland sponsored

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the accreditation. A self-evaluation report was writ-ten, based on criteria set by the American accredit-ing agency. The main focus was on the curriculumand the structure of the programme, quality controland asserting whether the programme met the ba-sic requirements for accreditation. The ABET evalu-ation report had some influence on the Universityof Iceland as a whole. It was the first time a foreignbody was invited to evaluate an educational pro-gramme at the University and as such it generatedinterest and discussions in other faculties.

In 1997, the BSc in Diagnostic Radiography of-fered by the Icelandic College of Engineering andTechnology was validated and accredited by theTechnology College of Radiographers. The pro-gramme was accredited for a period of five years.The follow up will be conducted during 2002.

The aim of quality assurance in highereducation in Iceland

Iceland does not have a separate national agencyfor evaluation of education, but a separate divisionof evaluation and supervision in the Ministry ofEducation, Science and Culture was established in1996. The division is responsible for evaluation atall school levels from pre-school to higher educa-tion.

In line with the law on higher education the Min-ister of Education, Science and Culture passed aregulation in May 1999 regarding quality controlof university instruction, which requires universi-ties to set up a formal, internal quality assessmentsystem.

The Ministry of Education, Science and Culturetakes the initiative to conduct an external evalua-tion, when it will be carried out and the focus. Forthis task an external, independent group of special-ists, is appointed to implement the quality assess-ment. The evaluations that have been carried out inhigher education have so far focused on pro-grammes or disciplines. A specific programmewithin higher education such as the political sci-ence programme at the University of Iceland havebeen evaluated and also disciplines across institu-tions, for example business management, teachereducation and nursing education.

The main elements of the external evaluationprocess are a self-evaluation, conducted within therespective institution(s) and a peer review team vis-iting the institution(s)/faculty. The peer review teamverifies and comments on the content of the self-evaluation report, as well as responds to questionsraised by the report and during the site visit andwrite a report on its findings. The results are pub-lished, after the institutions in question have madetheir comments. External evaluations of higher edu-cation have focused on educational activities (teach-ing and learning).

Higher education institutions have to fulfil theirobligations on quality assurance in teaching by set-ting up a formal internal quality assessment sys-tem. This consists of a systematic evaluation ofteachers work, for example, assessment of teach-ing by students, teachers self-evaluation and for-mal reaction of the governing body in question, (thedepartment or the faculty), with the purpose of im-proving the quality of the teaching. In May 2001higher education institutions have to send a descrip-tion of its quality system to the Ministry of Educa-tion, Science and Culture and publish it officially.

Discussion on the Icelandic experience

Higher education institutions in Iceland shall con-stantly be working on internal quality assessment.On the other hand there are no rules on how oftenexternal evaluation is to be carried out. For the lastyears approximately one or two external evaluationshave been carried out annually.

Quality assessment in higher education does nothave conditional effects on the institution in ques-tion, like for example on grants. On the other handthe objectives of an evaluation are to improve thequality of teaching in higher education institution,encourage institutions to use the tools of qualitymanagement to improve their organization and in-crease flexibility in their operations and make theinstitutions more accountable for their activities.

So far, there has been a limited debate on ac-creditation in Iceland.

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4.4 Norway

Before 1998, when the Network Norway Council(NNR) was established, there had been scatteredevaluations of Norwegian higher education, but noconsistent evaluation programme. From the start,the NNR was given the responsibility for nationalquality assurance in higher education as part of itsmission5 . The NNR now carries out various typesof evaluations and, by the end of 1999, a qualityassurance system, designed to cover all institutions,had been developed and is currently being tested ina pilot project with four institutions. The system isscheduled to become fully operative from 2003,when it may also accommodate an accreditationmission, if such a mechanism is chosen.

The NNR has only an advisory function to theMinistry of Education, which retains all powers ofissuing formal approval to courses, programmes orinstitutions. This power is not exercised through anykind of explicit accreditation arrangement, but ratherthrough certain standard procedures prior to theMinistry’s decisions and, to some extent, eventhrough direct delegation to the institutions them-selves. The term “accreditation” is, therefore, notused in any technical sense, so “approval”6 is thepreferred term. The process only affects new pro-grammes that the institutions want to introduce, withno systematic follow-up control of approved pro-grammes.

When discussing present-day accreditation-likepractices in Norway, a major distinction must bemade between State-owned and privately-ownedinstitutions. The two types are covered by separatelaws and have their educational programmes ap-proved through different procedures. State institu-tions are covered by the Universities and CollegesAct, 1995, whereas decisions concerning the pri-vate sector are made under the Private Colleges Act,1986.

Institutions owned by the State

In 2000, the State-owned institutions had 92% ofthe total student population and received 98% ofpublic expenditure on higher education in Norway.The State sector includes 38 institutions, all men-tioned by name and under its specific category inthe Universities and Colleges Act:

• all 4 of Norway’s full-scale universities• 6 specialist university colleges• 26 state colleges• 2 art colleges

Although the Act mentions four different catego-ries, it recognises only one formal distinction be-tween them: the special responsibility that univer-sities and university colleges have for educatingresearchers, that is, to maintain doctoral pro-grammes and to award doctoral degrees. But evendoctoral degrees have, for some time now, beenawarded by a few private colleges as well and in2000, three state colleges obtained the same rightin defined subject areas.

There are, however, clear structural differencesbetween the categories of institutions:

• Research activity is much higher in universitiesand university colleges than in the State and artcolleges, which is reflected in the pattern of fund-ing.

• Universities/university colleges offer pro-grammes at the higher degree level in most es-tablished fields, whereas State colleges generallyhave fewer such programmes.

• Certain programmes for professional qualifica-tions (for example, law, theology, psychology,medicine, dental medicine, veterinary medicine)are restricted to universities or university col-leges, whereas State colleges dominate in fieldslike teaching, nursing and professions related tothe arts.

The system of programme approval inState-owned institutions

The fact that the State institutions exist by law, andare subject to governmental regulation, implicitlymakes them institutionally accredited. Accordingto the Universities and Colleges Act, the Govern-

5 The Network Norway Council is a multi-mission agency. Inaddition to serving as a quality assurance agency, it is also theMinistry’s chief advisory body in all other matters concerninghigher education in Norway.

6 In Norwegian: “godkjenning”. (See definitions under 2.1)

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ment decides which degrees, subjects, professionaltraining programmes and other educational pro-grammes an institution can offer, but the Act alsoprovides for the possibility of delegating some ofthese powers to the institutions. At present, theGovernment has delegated the following powers:

• Subject to guidelines given by the Ministry, theinstitutions themselves make decisions on therecognition or validation of education from pri-vate institutions or from institutions abroad. Insome cases, such decisions can be appealed atthe national level. The NAIC (ENIC) section ofThe Network Norway Council advises the insti-tutions in cases of international credit transfer.

• Guidelines given by the Ministry also describehow all types of State institutions, without anyfurther process of approval, can offer courses ofup to 90 (ECTS) credits at the lower degree levelwithin subject areas that are already establishedat the institution. The Government recently an-nounced its intention to extend this to 120 cred-its.

In other cases, State institutions need the Ministry’sapproval in order to launch a new programme, thatis, for all programmes outside established disci-plines, all programmes covering more than 90 cred-its, all programmes that lead to professional authori-sation (for example, teachers) and all programmesat the higher (Master’s) degree level.

In order to obtain an approval, the institution mustpresent a study plan for the new course or pro-gramme and account for the competence of theteaching staff, the curriculum, exam arrangements,infrastructure such as teaching facilities, library,computers and other necessary equipment, etc. Theinstitution’s presentation is then scrutinised by anumber of institutions who already offer the sametype of programme, before the Ministry gives itsfinal word. In some cases, where no equivalent ex-ists in Norway, such an assessment is obtained fromforeign institutions.

In the Ministry’s decision, academic quality as-sessment – what we might call the proper “accredi-tation” function – is mingled with other considera-tions. Since a licence to start a new programmeautomatically entails State funding, a needs analy-

sis will also be made. However, the Ministry willalways give its reasons for turning down an appli-cation. More often than not, denial of approval isgrounded in a failure, on the part of the institution,to account for the need to offer the programme andmake a convincing argument that it will attract stu-dents.

Applications for new programmes are occasion-ally assessed by the Network Norway Council, whothen advise the Ministry on what decision to make.This is done in all cases when State or private col-leges apply for the right to award doctoral degreesin a defined subject area. For this purpose, the Coun-cil has developed guidelines that spell out what re-quirements must be fulfilled by the institution. Someapplications to establish new programmes on thehigher degree level are also heard by the Council.The Council will then concentrate on making anacademic assessment, leaving considerations ofneed to the Ministry.

The system of programme approvalin private colleges

For the academic year of 1999/2000, Norway had19 private colleges that offered approved coursesor programmes of higher education, with studentnumbers (in approved courses) ranging from 22 to9,631. Many of the smaller institutions, in fact, pro-vide a variety of other courses that do not qualifyas “higher education”. Seven private colleges hadstudent numbers of 500 or more in approvedcourses, whereas only two had more than a thou-sand. By far the largest private institution is theNorwegian School of Management BI.

Since private institutions of higher education arenot steered by the Government like the State insti-tutions are, they do not enjoy the same rights as defacto “accredited” institutions either. Consequently,they cannot start up new courses, however small,without approval by the Ministry. Under the Pri-vate Colleges Act, the Ministry recognises the pri-vate colleges’ right to examinations and degrees atthe single programme (or course) level. Such rec-ognition automatically entails public funding (as afixed percentage of an estimated standard cost) ifthe college meets one of the following conditions:

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• that it is founded for religious or ethical purposes,or

• that it is founded as a pedagogical alternative topublic provision, or

• that it completes public provision in fields wherethere are unmet needs.

As preconditions for obtaining approvals, the Pri-vate Colleges Act lists certain requirements con-cerning the colleges’ steering system and adminis-trative procedures. The Act then defines the qualitystandard for approval by simply referring to theState provision, stating that private programmesmust have “the same quality”. In turn, recognitiongives access to public funding and to national titlesand degrees. The Private Colleges Act explicitlyinstructs the Government to approve of all privateeducation that meets the requirements of the Act.

In its application for approval, a college mustdemonstrate “equal quality” in terms of entrancerequirements, course content and literature, teach-ing methods, the competence of teachers and exter-nal examiners as well as examination arrangements.The application is routinely sent to the NetworkNorway Council, which makes its recommendationbased on advice from a group of experts, after whichthe Ministry will make its decision. For subsequentchanges in the programme – even quite minor ones– the college will have to file an entirely new appli-cation. In 2000, there were 53 such applicationsfrom private colleges.

Discussion on Norwegian experiences

At the same time as the Network Norway Councilcame into being, the Mjøs Commission (after thename of its leader) was set up by the Governmentto propose reforms in Norwegian higher education.The Commission published its report (NorwegianMinistry of Education, Research and Church Af-fairs, 2000) in May 2000 and one of its recommen-dations was that an independent “Evaluation andAccreditation Centre” be set up in order to organ-ise national evaluations and a systematic accredita-tion programme. In the Commission’s view, this wasa natural consequence of the increased de facto au-tonomy of higher education institutions in Norway,and even more necessary in the light of the Com-

mission’s proposals for further deregulation. How-ever, the idea of a new accreditation agency wasnot followed up in the Government’s White Paperon higher education (St.meld, nr. 27 (2000–2001).Norwegian ministry of Education, Research andChurch Affairs). Instead, the Government wants tobuild on the present NNR, while making it moreexclusively an “instrument for quality”.

Parliament will handle the Government’s WhitePaper in the early summer of 2001. Based on Par-liament’s ruling, it will be left to the Ministry todesign a policy in this area. In the meantime, un-certainty and debate continue around the followingissues:

• Should national quality assurance of higher edu-cation be organised with a higher degree of in-dependence from the Ministry? This could meanthat the quality assurance function is taken fromthe present Network Norway Council and organ-ised in a separate agency. Or it could mean thatthe present structure is preserved, following a re-definition of the Council’s position. Nor is it madeclear whether the NNR should still have its dualcharacter of general advisory body to the Minis-try and quality assurance agency.

• Should national quality assurance contain a spe-cific and explicit accreditation function? Or willsystematic evaluations without such a functionprovide sufficient information to students andstakeholders and sufficient transparency for statefunding?

• Should the power to recognise foreign educationas part of national diplomas still rest with theinstitutions, or should the present advisory func-tion of the Network Norway Council/NAIC beextended to include recognition?

• Should accreditation – in case it is introduced –meet higher education at the programme or in-stitutional level? So far, the policy and practiceof the Network Norway Council points in thedirection of the institutional level, but a new orredefined agency will obviously have to recon-sider its strategy in the light of new regulations.

• Should private institutions be given the opportu-nity to apply for institutional accreditation, so thatthey may obtain the same autonomy in relation

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to their own programmes as the State institutionspresently enjoy? For a long time, it has been thecomplaint of private colleges that present ar-rangements are unnecessarily cumbersome andbureaucratic. The White Paper, however, fails toannounce any changes in the Private CollegesAct.

• Should institutions be “forever” defined as be-longing to a certain category, or should there bean open structure, where transfer from one cat-egory to another is possible, following a processof institutional accreditation? At this point theWhite Paper goes further than the Mjøs Reportby indicating that any college that awards doc-toral degrees in a single subject area may be rec-ognised as a university. This arrangement, if it isaccepted by Parliament, would increase thenumber of universities in Norway from four tomore than 15 at a single stroke, and is now oneof the most heatedly debated issues of the highereducation reform.

So far, there has not really been a public debate onaccreditation in Norway. Before the university andcollege sectors came under the same law, the Uni-versity Council would set the academic standardsfor admitting programmes in the college sector (bothState and private) into university degrees, and therewere those who thought that a more formalised ac-creditation scheme ought to be established for thispurpose. After 1995, however, as the new Act reor-ganised the college sector into fewer and strongerinstitutions and did away with formal distinctionsbetween universities and colleges, the idea lost sup-port.

Among the private colleges, on the other hand,there has, for a long time, been a number of institu-tions of sufficient breadth and quality to nourishambitions of becoming “institutionally accredited”with the same rights as institutions in the State sec-tor. The demand for an accreditation instrument toaward such recognition has increased in intensityover the last few years and it is expected that theprivate colleges will try to persuade Parliament towrite this function into the Private Colleges Act inconnection with its treatment of the White Paper.

The Mjøs Commission brought the issue of ac-creditation back on the agenda, when it recom-mended the establishing of an independent accredi-tation and evaluation agency. This proposal waslinked to several others, all of them springing outof a general philosophy that advocated a furtherderegulation of higher education. But it is a sign ofhow little interest the question of accreditationarouses that the debate that followed the Mjøs Re-port hardly touched on the quality assurance issueat all (although much was said about quality, andthe White Paper was subtitled “a quality reform forhigher education”). As it turned out, the White Pa-per said no to most of the proposed deregulationmeasures and made no hints at an accreditation pro-gramme. That may have settled the issue, althougha minority Government cannot be certain of havingits way in Parliament.

4.5 Sweden

Accreditation of higher education in Sweden is un-derstood as a quality evaluation of a subject, pro-gramme, an institution or a professional degree end-ing in a decision saying yes or no. There will al-ways be a follow up and the process will be reiter-ated after a given time.

The accreditation activity may follow after anapplication from an institution (private or public)or on a regular basis according to a national pro-gramme for evaluation. The criteria for the assess-ment, if not already in place, will be developed inco-operation between the State and the institutionsin the higher education sector.

Swedish system

There are 39 institutions in the higher educationsector in Sweden. There are 16 universities with ageneral right to award doctoral degrees in all topicsand another three institutions with a limited rightto award doctoral degrees. The university collegeshave the right to award degrees at the undergradu-ate level. There is a performance-based fundingsystem for the undergraduate level from the Gov-ernment. The Government also funds the doctoral

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programmes, although there are also externalfunders of doctoral education. There is a HigherEducation Act and ordinance regulating the workof higher education institutions.

Accreditation was introduced in Sweden by a newact for higher education in 1993. The aim of the actwas to give more freedom to the institutions andthe national system for curricula was abolished. Theestablished universities were given a general rightto award all exams including doctoral degrees attheir own discretion. The university colleges weregiven the right to award Bachelor’s degrees.

Such a decentralised system required a systemfor quality control in order to create trust and makethe institutions accountable for their activities. Aquality audit system and accreditation procedureswere implemented in order to support and controlthe quality in higher education. A system for evalu-ations was even implemented.

The National Agency for Higher Education wasestablished by the Swedish Government in 1995 asa successor to previous Government agencies withthe mandate to evaluate higher education. TheAgency has performed quality audits, evaluation ofsubjects/disciplines and programmes, accreditationof institutions and subjects. The Agency derives itsauthority from the Government, but its agenda isonly partially set by the Government. The Agencyis reaches a decision after a quality assessment onthe right for the institutions to award exams.

However, the establishment of new universitiesis decided by the Government and recognised bylaw. The Government will also make decisions fornew professional degrees and all applications fromprivate institutions, after a quality assessment per-formed by the Agency.

The costs for all quality reviews are paid by theAgency from the budget set by the Parliament, andcover the costs for experts, travelling, writing a re-port, etc. The higher education institutions will carrythe costs for their own self-evaluation report.

The purpose of quality reviewsin Sweden

The policy of the National Agency for Higher Edu-cation, responsible for the accreditation activity, isbased on an act of Parliament (the Government Bill1999/2000:28). According to the Government Bill,the new quality assurance system will be developedto ensure that:

• “the quality of the programme and the results ofthe quality work are placed at the focus of theevaluation process,

• a review system will be created that is compre-hensive both for institutions and programmes,and is carried out periodically,

• students will be provided with better opportuni-ties for participation and influence, and

• the independent responsibility for universitiesand university colleges for quality assurance anddevelopment, as well as the independent reviewfunction of the National Agency for Higher Edu-cation will be safeguarded.”

The Agency performs two different kinds of accredi-tation activities. There are reviews of all subjectsand programmes in a period of six years, starting2001 and ending 2006, and quality assessment onrequest from an institution (private or public) toupgrade their right to award degrees. These assess-ments will end in a yes or no decision by the Agency.The Government will make the final decision forprivate institutions, and for questions concerningthe right to award doctoral degrees for both privateand public institutions.

The aims of the quality reviews of all subjectsand programmes are:

• Control: In order to get or retain the right to awarddegrees, the higher education institutions mustreach a certain level of quality. The subject andprogramme will be reviewed in relation to thegeneral goals and instructions for higher educa-tion given in the Higher Education Act and theHigher Education Ordinance. Students should beoffered equivalent education of good quality, re-gardless of their choice of higher education in-stitution.

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• Development: The higher education institutionsshould be able to use the evaluations in their ownquality development work. The evaluationsshould stimulate renewal and diversity in disci-plines and programmes.

• Information: To support the need for easily avail-able information about different subjects and pro-grammes by students and other stakeholders.

• Comparisons: The information should be suchthat the students and others may compare sub-jects and programmes at different higher educa-tion institutions in order to decide which is themost suitable programme for them. It should alsobe possible to compare Swedish higher educa-tion internationally, particularly in the light ofincreased mobility across national borders.

The primary aim of these evaluations, according tothe bill, is to “mobilise the inner forces of the highereducation institutions’ quality work”, – As theAgency sees it that includes all levels and from dif-ferent perspectives in order to stimulate the renewaland development of education and the ambitionsfrom the higher education institution to meet newdemands and challenges from a changing world.The reviews can contribute to emphasise and sup-port different initiatives to constructive renewals inthe organisation of education, content and pedagogyamong the different programmes. Comparison doesnot mean one-dimensional ranking of different pro-grammes. Equivalent education does not mean thateducation in the same subject must be the same atevery higher education institution. On the contrary,such an order would hamper creativity, renewal anddevelopment of higher education.

For the higher education institutions, importantaspects include further development of their qual-ity assurance systems, the internal process of self-assessment at different levels, and providing thestudents with better opportunities for participationand influence. Naturally, the participation of teach-ers and other staff in the developmental processesis also very important.

The National Agency for Higher Education willreview quality development in subjects and pro-grammes and report the results of those reviews to

the institution, the government, and the generalpublic. The main purpose of these reviews is tostimulate quality development in the higher educa-tion institutions and their different educationalcourses and programmes. But it is also a processfor control, in order to accredit subjects and pro-grammes in the interests of the student. A certainacademic standard must always be offered.

The Agency also performs institutional reviewsin a cycle of three years, but this is not an accredi-tation process. There will be no decision on a yesor no basis according to the institutional reviews.The aim here is to support the development of thehigher education institutions’ quality assurance sys-tem. There will be a public report with criticismand recommendations.

Who sets the criteria

The aspects which will be the focus for evaluations,and the criteria, are developed in a dialogue betweenthe Agency and higher education institutions. TheAgency will suggest what aspects will be evalu-ated in the review. Various partners from the highereducation institutions such as deans, professors andvice chancellors will discuss and confirm the as-pects or criteria.

Important aspects for the review of subjects andprogrammes are:

Prerequisites for education• Recruitment and student groups• Teaching skills, scientific expertise and oppor-

tunities for staff development• Goals, content and organisation of education• Library and other information support• Facilities and equipmentProcess of education• The student/doctoral student working situation• The teachers’ working situation• Programme structure• Modes of examination• A critical and creative environment for learningResults of education• Quality assurance of courses and programmes,

monitoring and assuring quality within courses,programmes, departments, faculties and institu-

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tions and higher education institution’s systemfor quality enhancement

• Follow ups of quality assurances, from formerstudents (for example, alumni) and from otherstakeholders such as employers

• Throughput.

The general structure of these evaluations is as fol-lows:• Self-assessment (supported by developed guide-

lines).• External assessment group (including interna-

tional assessors and student representatives) forpeer reviews.

• On-site visit of the assessment group, in order toobserve the institution in action and discuss theinstitution and/or programme with various mem-bers of the staff and students.

• Feedback with statements and recommendationsfor further development from the assessmentgroup and opportunities for the department, fac-ulty or programme in question to react on thatfeedback.

• Public report and a decision by the UniversityChancellor (the head of the Agency) on approvalor disapproval.

• Follow-ups.

In case a review shows an unexpected low quality,the University Chancellor will, according to a Gov-ernment regulation, give the institution one or twoyears to improve the quality. A special review willfollow the decision. If the quality has not been im-proved to an acceptable level, the right to awardthe degree in that subject or programme will bewithdrawn from the institution. The institution isthen responsible to ensure the students can take theirexams. In practice, this implies that the institutionmust purchase the service from another universitywho will offer the degree to the students.

Discussion on the Swedish experience

As the six year review programme of subjects andprogrammes was implemented in 2001, there is asyet nothing to discuss. The Swedish experience ofaccreditation is more related to assessments con-cerning new degrees on request from the institu-tions. This has been a process of both support andcontrol on the part of the Agency. It has been in theinterest of the institutions to gain new rights to awarddegrees, for example, Master’s (magister) and PhD.The accreditation procedure has worked as a driv-ing force concerning the quality in the institutionsin order to gain new rights. The ‘stick and carrot’have been efficient tools in the process.

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5.1 Tradition and background

The higher education sector in the Nordic countriesshows great similarities. That also goes for the re-lationship between the state and the (predominantlystate-owned) institutions and for the philosophiesand methodologies that the quality assurance agen-cies base their evaluation practice on. As to the wayin which higher education has been steered, moni-tored and controlled in the Nordic countries, threefeatures stand out:

1. Institutional protection and autonomy.

Traditionally, the institutions have enjoyed trust,autonomy and a large measure of protection andsecure funding. Government steering and controlhave mainly taken the forms of setting targets anddemanding reports on institutional economy, stu-dent places and candidate production. Under theprotection of regulated systems of student intake,there was also for a long time relatively little pres-sure to compete for funds and students among theinstitutions. Inside this broad framework of macro-level regulation, it has been left to academia itselfto define its own tasks and set its own standards.Academic freedom and institutional autonomy,however, has been offset by a lack of scope for stra-tegic action. While there is obviously a connectionbetween these two features, the institutions’ rela-tive inability to act strategically has chiefly beendue to a combination of massive growth in the stu-dent population after the mid-80s, the linking offunding to student numbers, and the institutions’societal obligation to reproduce, develop and dis-seminate broad fields of knowledge. The institu-tions have been locked in a system that linkedeconomy to linear growth rather than to strategicand methodological innovation. With modern-typederegulation, the gradual opening of a national (andinternational) education market and the advent ofthe “audit society”, however, this is now about tochange. The focus is now very much on meeting

new challenges and finding viable strategies in achanging world of higher education.

2. Development-oriented quality assurance.

The aims of evaluations have traditionally empha-sised quality development more than quality con-trol. In this sense, the term “quality assurance”, withits obvious connotations of control and auditing,may seem a little misleading. Evaluations haverested firmly on the evaluated units’ own self-as-sessments and a kind of external assessment where“critical friends” – or peers/experts – look at eachothers’ professional competence and practise. Al-though there have been – and still are – good rea-sons for this, not least the very complex and dy-namic concept of quality one must relate to in highereducation, this practice is also open to criticism fortaking little account of outside needs and interests.But even this feature is changing. Tracing studies,more emphasis on student and employer opinion,the use of evaluators with experience outside highereducation, greater stress on goal-fulfilment, etc aregradually making quality assurance more univer-sally transparent and accountable. The introductionof accreditation would be just another means ofmeeting the increasing demand for accountability.

3. Government steering and approval.

In the “Nordic model”, the licensing of higher edu-cation is not just an isolated matter of quality as-surance, but also linked with considerations of edu-cational policy, and consequently with needs analy-sis and funding. Accordingly, the final authority onlicensing – or approval – rests with the Govern-ment, as part of its total steering of the sector. Butthe gradual shift from steering by regulation to steer-ing by objectives and results, and the setting up ofnational quality assurance agencies, have meant thatmuch of the actual approval function has been trans-ferred to these agencies and thus become more

5 Conclusions and Suggestions

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professionalised, although the formal power rela-tions have remained much the same. The introduc-tion of an accreditation regime would make the dis-tinction between academic (or quality) accredita-tion and political steering even more explicit andconspicuous.

5.2 Accreditation andquality assurance in theNordic countries today

In procedures of initial approval, the role of thequality assurance agency varies slightly from oneNordic country to another. It also depends onwhether the case in point concerns a course, a pro-gramme, education at the bachelor, master or doc-toral degree level, a private or a state institution, orthe status of an entire institution. The main func-tion of the quality assurance agency is always to bean umpire of whether the unit in question holds –or can be expected to hold – an acceptable level ofquality. A systematic accreditation arrangementwould require that the agency must treat all casesof initial approval according to set procedures.

A systematic accreditation arrangement wouldalso require that all initially approved/accreditedunits must be regularly checked at certain intervals.The normal mechanism for carrying out such fol-low-ups would be evaluation based on predefinedstandards resulting in accreditation, which so farhave been the main business of the quality assur-ance agencies:

• Denmark has, for many years, followed a policyof evaluating all higher education by subject orprogramme. Such evaluations are common inmany European countries, for instance, in GreatBritain and the Netherlands, where they also have– or will have – an explicit accrediting function.So far, however, Danish subject evaluations havemainly had a developmental aim. The Evalua-tion Institute has not yet decided how the evalu-ations of HE will be carried out in the future.The decision will be taken on the basis of anumber of pilot projects conducted over the nextcouple of years.

• Finland has partial procedures for following upthe accreditations of polytechnics. In the univer-sity sector, institutional evaluations may informgovernment decisions on approval and funding,but there is no formal mechanism. Institutionalevaluations in Finland emphasise the develop-mental aspect and the relationship between theinstitution and society. Accreditation of Profes-sional courses emphasises heavily on develop-mental aspects. The results of the described pro-cedures seem promising.

• Norway is about to choose its future approach tonational quality assurance. After a trial periodwith institutional evaluations of the four univer-sities, various programme and theme evaluationsand a pilot project with a proposed “quality as-surance system”, this latter system, which is akind of “fortified” institutional audit, is sched-uled to become operative as from 2003. If Nor-way should opt for accreditation, this systemmight probably be designed to include such afunction too.

• Sweden has performed accreditation activitiessince 1993 after application from the institutions.The Agency has also carried out a full cycle ofinstitutional audits, in addition to various otherevaluations. The audits, which emphasised de-velopment rather than control, are now beingtoned down, whereas a programme of compre-hensive and systematic subject evaluations isbeing introduced and will be carried out between2001 and 2006. The planned round of subjectevaluations will include some kind of accredit-ing mission, as they will affect the right to giveexaminations or award degrees.

The most important consequence of shifting to anaccreditation system would probably be the effectthat this would have on evaluation practice. In mak-ing this shift, each country would have to analysehow their current evaluation practice and method-ologies would have to be modified or extended inorder to carry this additional function, and whetheraccreditation would then be cost-effective and addvalue in terms of total quality assurance and qual-ity development.

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5.3 Accreditation ina Nordic perspective

The previous discussion in this paper would seemto indicate the following conclusions on the ques-tion of accreditation, as seen in a Nordic perspec-tive:

1. The main argument against accreditation as asystematic tool for quality assurance would bethat this might have a negative effect on otheraspects of quality work. If evaluations are to fo-cus on yes–no verdicts according to set stand-ards, there may be less scope for evaluation meth-odologies that promote quality development andinnovation. Set standards may have the effect ofconserving a static and reductionist concept ofquality, which would seem to break with an es-tablished tradition in the Nordic countries thatvalues support over control in evaluations. Also,there are the very real dangers of bureaucracy,ritualism and defensive strategies. If Nordic coun-tries were to opt for accreditation, it would be acrucial task to identify how it could be conductedwithout too heavy and standardised procedures,and without undermining academic autonomyand the institutions’ own responsibilities formaintaining good quality education.

2. Only Sweden has, to some extent, procedures forinitial accreditation today. Sweden is also the onlyNordic country that has taken steps to systemati-cally control approved units of higher educationvia evaluations. In the other Nordic countries,and partly even in Sweden, decisions on the ini-tial accreditation/approval of higher educationtake place in the Ministry of Education, wherethey merge with deliberations founded in educa-tional policy. As for follow-up measures, evalu-ations have hitherto been little concerned withthe control function. For reasons of transparencyand accountability, a more explicit mechanismof accreditation might be favourable.

3. Deregulation and increased autonomy for highereducation institutions also speak in favour ofmore systematic arrangements of formal ap-proval, carried out by independent quality assur-

ance agencies. So do the massification of highereducation, the spread of new (virtual) modes ofdelivery and the increasing occurrence of franch-ising arrangements. Pressure from the outside isanother factor: if a pro-accreditation policy gainsground in Europe, the Nordic countries may feelobliged to conform in order to maintain their in-ternational position in a situation with new pat-terns of mobility and inter-institutional competi-tion.

4. Quality assurance with a stress on accountabil-ity and transparency does not necessarily meanthat the formal power of approval/accreditationhas to move from the Ministry to an outsideagency. Rather, the important point is that thereis an independent agency to give systematic, for-mal and public judgement on approval/accredi-tation according to explicit (academic) criteria,so that academic and political processes areclearly separated.

5. Quality assurance in the Nordic countries showsgreat similarities, but the actual evaluationmethodologies still vary from one country to an-other. Therefore, there is no ready basis for a com-mon Nordic system of accreditation. Each coun-try must have the opportunity to choose whetherit wants to implement this mechanism, and tofound an eventual accreditation arrangement onevaluation methodologies of its own choice. Forinstance, it must be possible to carry outaccreditations either via the institutional or viathe programme/subject level. A “second level”of Nordic accreditation – on top of national ar-rangements – is not a viable option, as it wouldadd bureaucracy rather than value.

6. There is still scope for co-operative Nordic ar-rangements without establishing new bureauc-racies. The Nordic quality assurance agenciesmaintain a useful network for the purpose of ex-changing information and learning from eachother’s operations. This also provides an arenafor deepening the mutual understanding of thequality requirements that underpin recognitionsin each country. Further work along these lines,in part organised as single projects, may help

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extend and facilitate the inter-Nordic mobility ofstudents and degrees (e.g. the existing Nordicagreement on mutual professional recognition),and promote the acceptance of Nordic degreesin other countries. Also, the defining of a broad,common platform of quality assurance wouldreflect favourably back on the credibility ofhigher education in each Nordic country, andmight be an effective means of promoting theNordic values and methodologies of quality as-surance in the outside world.

5.4 Accreditation in a widerinternational perspective

Neither a free accreditation market, nor a unitarysystem of European accreditation, is likely to ma-terialise in the near future. For all its emphasis onthe need to create a “European space of higher edu-cation”, the Bologna Declaration makes it clear thatthe individual nations’ approach to quality assur-ance must be respected and that any European di-mension in this field must rest on national systems.At the same time, the need for Europe to put itshouse in order is stressed. A recent project entitledTowards Accreditation Schemes for Higher Educa-tion in Europe?, organised by the Association ofEuropean Universities and co-funded by the Soc-rates Programme, concluded at its validation semi-nar in Lisbon in February 2001 that there is “a needfor a trans-European quality assurance frameworkwhich would ensure the international visibility, com-patibility and credibility of European higher edu-cation degrees”.

Based on the present situation, the followingpoints may indicate a shared Nordic position on theissue of accreditation of higher education inside aEuropean framework:

1. With regard to the international acceptance ofcredits and degrees across national boundaries,the right for individual countries to choose itsown method of approving/accrediting highereducation should be preserved, as long as theseprocedures adhere to broad common definitions

of what higher education is, and to generally ac-cepted principles of quality assurance.

2. Supra-national accrediting arrangements shouldbe based on mutual acceptance or recognition,depending on responsible and transparent qual-ity assurance systems in each country. Interna-tional information exchange and co-operation inthe field of quality assurance should be encour-aged, as done by the European Network of Qual-ity Assurance Agencies. A European system ofaccreditation, however, is not to be wished for,for the following (and other) reasons:

• Different national traditions and cultures in thehigher education sector – and in quality assur-ance – are a value of diversity in themselves andshould be safeguarded.

• Correspondence must be ensured between thepolitically authorising level and the level of qual-ity assurance practice. Quality assurance musthave a national foundation as long as higher edu-cation is primarily funded and regulated nation-ally.

• Accreditations have to be rooted in commonlyaccepted standards. Detailed European standardswould not be able to take account of the enor-mous diversity in institutions, degrees and pro-grammes that will exist in Europe, even after aconvergence process towards a Bachelor’s/Mas-ter’s degree structure. And if it did, it could notdo so without a standardising and conservingeffect on aims and content that is undesirable.

• Costs and bureaucracy load would be intolerable.

3. In general, European higher education enjoys ahigh reputation in the world. It is not proven thatthe competitiveness of European higher educa-tion in a global education market will be en-hanced through a unified system of accreditation.In this situation, a European co-ordinated effortin quality assurance should rather stress a devel-opment towards excellence by stimulating inter-national benchmarking arrangements and ex-change of information about good practices in-side the various disciplines and for whole insti-tutions.

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5.5 Final remarks

Governments may be reluctant to hand over theirtraditional power of accreditation or approval to anoutside accrediting body, and thus separate approvalfrom policy and steering. There may be good argu-ments for that, particularly in terms of national eco-nomics. For reasons of fairness and transparency,though, it can be argued that decisions on approvalor accreditation must be based on a system of inde-pendent quality assurance, exercised according toa defined mandate by an autonomous authority,whose findings and verdicts are made public. Theimportant thing is to make clear to stakeholders andthe general public which is which: quality assur-ance and political decision-making.

As long as quality assurance is comprehensive,competent, open and independent, the question ofwhether to adopt a system of explicit accreditationis more a one of principle and a practical one. Themost important consequence of opting for accredi-tation would be that this would add new demandsto the way evaluations are conducted: it would re-quire a certain scope and format in order to coverall higher education in a responsible way, and itwould have methodological implications, some ofwhich might in fact be negative.

On the whole, the established quality assuranceagencies of the Nordic countries have developedsufficient expertise and experience to handle anaccreditation mission, should they be given such atask by their respective political authorities. It could

be argued, though, whether this is really necessary,and whether it would be a wise quality assurancepolicy for our educational environment.

The present Nordic accreditation project wasundertaken on the assumption that there is a sharedunderstanding of academic quality and quality as-surance in the Nordic countries. It also sprang outuncertainty as to whether higher education in theNordic countries would benefit from introducingaccreditation systems. While hopefully contribut-ing to illuminate the issue, this report cannot possi-bly come up with a definite “Nordic” position onthe question of accreditation. But the project hasclearly affirmed the assumption of shared attitudesto quality assurance. In spite of interesting and im-portant nuances, the ideas of academic quality, andthe philosophies that inform the endeavours to as-sure and promote this quality, are very similar inthe Nordic higher education area.

On this background, it may seem like a worth-while task to try to define a Nordic platform of qual-ity assurance in higher education, by recording ingreater depth and detail the common denominatorsthat actually exist. The Nordic countries have tra-ditionally represented a development-orientedstance in these matters, and may have philosophiesand evaluations practices that are worth promotingmore forcefully to the world outside. Particularly ifthe Nordic countries should decide not to chooseaccreditation as the way forward, a Nordic platformmight have considerable value – not unlike a qual-ity guarantee, in fact.

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References and related bibliography

Bauer, M., Askling B., Marton, S.G. & Marton F. (1999). Transforming Universities. Changing Patterns ofGovernance, Structure and Learning in Swedish Higher Education. Higher Education Policy Series 48.London: Jessica Kingsley Publishers.

Campbell & van der Wende, M. (2000). International Initiatives and Trends in Quality Assurance forEuropean Higher education. Exploratory Trend Report. ENQA Occasional Papers. Monila. Helsinki. Also onhttp://www.enqa.net/pubs.lasso

CHEA (2000). Judith S. Eaton in U.S. Accreditation Review. Available on the Internet http://www.chea.org/About/accreditation.html

CRE (2001). Towards Accreditation Schemes for Higher Education in Europe? The Association of EuropeanUniversities.

Dill, D. (2000). Designing Academic Audit: lessons learned in Europe and Asia in Quality in HigherEducation. Volume 6. Number 3, November 2000. Taylor & Francis Ltd. Philadelphia, USA.

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Norwegian Ministry of Education, Research and Church Affairs (2000). Freedom with Responsibility. OnHigher Education and Research in Norway, NOU 2000: 14.

Haug and Tauch (2001). Trends in Learning Structures in Higher Education (II). Follow-up Report preparedfor the Salamanca and Prague Conferences of March/May 2001. National Board of Education, Finland.Edita Oy. Also on http://www.oph.fi/publications/trends2

Hood, C. (1991). A Public Management for All Seasons? in Rhodes, R.A. W. (ed.) The New PublicManagement. Public Administration, 69 Number 1 (Spring).

Mjøs Report (2000). Ministry of Education, Research and Church Affairs. Norway.

Hämäläinen, K. and Kauppi, A. (2000). Evaluation in Today’s Education. From Control to Empowerment.LLine, Lifelong Learning in Europe. Vol V, Issue 2/2000. Westpoint. Rauma, Finland.

Hämäläinen, K., Pehu-Voima, S. & Wahlén, S. (2001). Institutional Evaluations in Europe. ENQA WorkshopReports 1. Helsinki. Also on http://www.enqa.net/pubs.lasso

Power M. (1999). The Audit Society, Rituals of Verification. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Sahlin-Andersson, K. & Hedmo, T. (2000). ”Från spridning till reglering. MBA-modellers utbredning ochutveckling i Europa”, Nordiske Organisationsstudier, Vol. 2, No.1, pp. 8–33.

Sohlo, S. (2000). Laatu polttopisteessä. Suomen yliopistojen rehtorien näkemyksiä laadusta ja senkehittämisestä. (In English: Quality in Focus. The University rectors view to quality and quality work.)Suomen yliopistojen rehtorien neuvoston julkaisuja 1/2000.

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