A Study Of Development And Reference Of European Quality Assurance Agencies For Higher Education

In the process of development,the external quality assurance agencies of higher education in various countries have encountered some obstacles and problems,especially how to provide effective external quality assurance actions for the changing higher education system.From the perspective of international comparison,Europe has made remarkable achievements in this field.Thanks to the institutional safeguards of the European Standards and Guidelines for Quality Assurance in European Higher Education Area(ESG)and the European Association for Quality Assurance in Higher Education(ENQA),coupled with the active response of national governments to the European quality assurance policy for higher education,more and more agencies are maturing.On the whole,under the Europe-national tension,the effective development of the external quality assurance agencies of European higher education is in a complex and dynamic change of convergence and diversity.At present,the series of policies of "separating the government authorities,management and assessment in higher education " and the response to the international quality assurance of higher education in China have highlighted the urgency of the construction of external quality assurance agencies of higher education.This thesis is an exploratory study on the development of external quality assurance agencies in European higher education,which is based on the Neo-institutionalism of sociology,management science,computer science and linguistics from an interdisciplinary perspective and in response to the call of national policies.The development of external quality assurance agencies in European higher education is effective.On the one hand,the organizational construction and operation mechanism of each agency provide the precondition for the effective development.On the other hand,ENQA’s periodic meta-assessment of the various agencies demonstrates their organizational and operational effectiveness.The effectiveness of development cannot be achieved without the joint role of regional organizations and national governments.Under the Europe-national tension,the external quality assurance agencies of higher education have developed an effective path: Firstly,each agency constructs itself and carries out the external quality assurance activities of higher education under the constraints of the national government,and applies for membership to ENQA on the basis of the domestic legitimacy.Secondly,each agency actively accepts the periodic meta-assessment of ENQA,and "negotiates" with the government on the condition of obtaining international legitimacy,so as to further improve the domestic institutional and technological environment.Finally,each agency maintains international legitimacy with stronger domestic legitimacy.The development of external quality assurance agencies of higher education in Europe is characterized by convergence.(1)The agency continues to maintain a high degree of convergence to ESG.There are two types of situations.First,compared with the past,the overall degree of compliance with ESG of the agency remains unchanged,and the degree of compliance with ESG of specific indicators has not changed significantly.The other is that the extent to which specific indicators conform to ESG has changed "up and down",but the extent to which the agency as a whole conforms to ESG has not changed.(2)The degree of compliance with ESG increased from low.This can be observed in two dimensions.First,under the same standard,the degree of convergence of the agency increases with the implementation of periodic meta-assessment.Second,the compliance degree of agencies to ESG 2015 is higher than that of ESG 2005.From the perspective of indicators,the agency shows obvious convergence in official status,independence,mission statement,resources and periodic external review.By means of corpus-driven analysis,it is concluded that the convergence of these agencies comes from four aspects: First,the practice exploration and experience sharing of the pilot project by agencies;Second,the EU’s financial support and policy guidance to the practice of European higher quality assurance;Third,the role participation and consensus building of national governments;Fourth,the Bologna Process mandates and sets standards for external quality assurance in higher education.In terms of its impact,convergence reduces the organizational and operational costs of agencies and promotes the mutual recognition of them in European higher education.However,convergence also hinders the individual development of agencies and weakens the national characteristics of them.The development of external quality assurance agencies in European higher education is also characterized by diversity.Under the standard of ESG 2005,the diversity of agencies in the second round of assessment were reduced to a certain extent compared with the first round.Under the ESG 2015 standard,the difference of institutions has changed from "rise to fall".From the perspective of the agency,the diversity is manifested in two types: one is the overall increase in the diversity,which mainly occurs in some agencies facing problems such as independence and resources.The other is that overall diversity are reduced,but partial diversity are increased,a feature that may be exhibited by agencies affected by periodic revisions to national legislation.From the perspective of indicators,there are diversity in resources,independence,accountability procedures,external quality assurance activities,policies and processes,thematic analysis,and internal quality assurance and professional guidance.According to the expert panel’s assessment report,the sources of diversity of agencies include: First,their interpretation of ESG varies to different degrees;Second,differences in their response to the legislation of their respective governments;Third,their ability to cultivate personnel differences;Fourth,their different dependence on financial resources;Fifth,the degree to which they disclose information.In terms of impact,diversity enhances dialogue among diverse stakeholders,drives institutional improvement,and enhances the global appeal of quality assurance in European higher education.However,diversity also makes it more difficult to conduct meta-assessments of agencies and poses challenges for building a European Higher Education Area.After demonstrating the suitability and feasibility of China’s learning from European experience,this thesis proposes the following lessons: First,to play the regulatory role of APQN as a regional network,including regulating the establishment of agencies,standards,operating mechanisms and continuous improvement.Second,the government should optimize the allocation of resources to agencies,including the allocation of human resources,financial resources,information resources and time resources.Third,to improve the comprehensive capacity of agencies,including:through the establishment of vocational training channels,to improve the professional ability of personnel;employ overseas well-known experts to enhance international participation capacity;receive periodic meta-assessment to improve the ability to implement actions;expand the audience of information disclosure to improve the ability of institutional influence.Fourth,we should advocate the collaborative governance of regional networks,governments and agencies.Among them,the regional network should give full play to the role of the connector;governments should continue to play a leading role;agencies should implement the role of a reliable performer.To promote the collaborative governance of regional network,government and agencies is to build a good regional ecological environment based on the external quality assurance standard framework of higher education;to expand government functions with the support of institutions and economic service;to enhance the capacity of external quality assurance agencies of higher education through cooperation and innovation.