Quality Assurance in the European Higher Education Area: a comparative study of the implementation of quality assurance standards and guidelines in the Netherlands, England and Spain

(1)

Quality assurance in the

European Higher Education Area

A comparative study of the implementation of quality assurance

standards and guidelines in the Netherlands, England and Spain

MA Thesis in European Studies: European policy

Graduate School of Humanities

Universiteit van Amsterdam

Author: Mariëlle Brouwer

Student number: 10000577

Main Supervisor: Dr A.C.van Wageningen

Second supervisor: Dr M. Rensen

July 2015

Words: 22 897

(2)

2

3 7. Conclusion ... 45 Bibliography ... 50 Appendix: Legislative provisions regarding quality assurance and agencies’ compliance with ESG .... 55 Table 1: Legislation and other provisions regarding higher education ... 55 Table 2: External quality assurance: compliance with part two of the ESG ... 61 Table 3: External quality assurance for agencies: compliance with part three of the ESG ... 66

(4)

4

List of abbreviations

ANECA Agencia Nacional de Evaluación de la Calidad y Acreditación CHEPS Centre for Higher Education Policy Studies

EACEA Education, Audiovisual and Culture Executive Agency ECTS European Credit Transfer System

EHEA European Higher Education Area

ENQA European Network for Quality Assurance in Higher Education EQAR European Quality Assurance Register for Higher Education ESG Standards and guidelines for quality assurance in the EHEA EUA European University Association

FHEA Further and Higher Education Act (UK, 1992)

HE Higher Education

HEA Higher Education Act (UK, 2004) HEFC Higher Education Funding Council (UK) HEQC Higher Education Quality Council (UK)

LOMLOU Amendment of Organic Law 6/2001 on Universities, Organic Law 4/2007 (Spain) LOU Organic Law 6/2001 on Universities (Spain)

LRU Ley de reforma universitaria

NVAO Nederlands-Vlaamse Accreditatieorganisatie OER Onderwijs- en examenregeling

QA Quality assurance

QAA Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education (UK) REACU Spanish Network of University Quality Assurance Agencies WHW Higher Education and Research Act (the Netherlands)

(5)

5

1. Introduction

The Sorbonne declaration of 1998, which was signed by the education ministers of France, Germany, Italy and the United Kingdom while participating in the celebration of the 800th anniversary of the University of Paris, marked the beginning of the harmonisation process of higher education in Europe. These four ministers all shared the view that the segmentation of the higher education sector in Europe was harmful and outdated. They decided to engage in the creation of the European Higher Education Area (EHEA) in order to strengthen the attractiveness of European higher education and to stimulate student mobility and employability through the introduction of a system with easily readable programmes and degrees, which was based on undergraduate and postgraduate studies (EHEA n.d.).

Just one year later, in 1999, the signing of the Bologna Declaration by 29 European states and the following Bologna Process created the European Higher Education Area (EHEA n.d.). The Bologna Process was designed to ensure comparability in the standards and quality of higher education qualifications in Europe. All the objectives agreed upon by the ministers of education of the signatory states should be implemented by the end of 2010. With the creation of the EHEA and the European Research Area, i.e. a system of research programmes created by the Bologna Process which aims to secure a closer relationship between research and education, the Bologna Process aims to establish a structure known as the ‘Europe of Knowledge’ (Kettunen and Kantola 2007, 68).Furthermore, in the 2003 Berlin Communiqué, the education ministers underlined the importance of ‘placing the quality of higher education at the heart of the establishment of a European Higher Education Area’ (Crosier and Parveva 2013, 42). During this conference the signatory states of the Bologna Declaration invited the European Network for Quality Assurance in Higher Education (ENQA) to develop ‘an agreed set of standards, procedures and guidelines on quality assurance’ in order to ‘explore ways of ensuring an adequate peer review system for quality assurance and/or accreditation agencies or bodies’ (ENQA 2009, 5). In 2005, ENQA created the Standards and Guidelines for Quality Assurance (ESG) in order to contribute to a common frame of reference for the provision of higher education and the assurance of quality within the EHEA (ENQA 2009, 13).

The comparability of the quality of education is an important feature for European Higher education and can eventually lead to mutual recognition of degrees throughout the EHEA, which will help to achieve the goals of the Bologna Process. In this master thesis I will investigate in what way the standards and guidelines for quality assurance of the EHEA are implemented in the Netherlands, Spain and England and how the implementation of these standards will lead to a comparable level of quality of education throughout these states. Many reports have been published in the past years about the implementation of the ESG and the establishment of quality assurance frameworks in the light of the Bologna process. Nonetheless, I did not find any reports that compare the

implementation process for different states and link this process to the legal traditions and historical roots of the higher education system of the states. I believe it is crucial to take this historical

background into account, since it will be useful when trying to explain current differences between the quality assurance systems in place.

I chose to investigate the Netherlands, Spain and England, since there are many differences between their higher education systems and the way they create higher education policy. In the Netherlands

(6)

6 the higher education policy is centralized and executed by the Ministry of Education and Culture (De Weert and Boezerooy 2007, 54), whereas in Spain the autonomous communities have a lot of autonomy to decide upon the way in which they implement higher education policy (Neave 2012, 106); in England universities have a lot of autonomy and are self-governing (Leišytė 2007, 15). Furthermore, the higher education systems of these three states emerged from different university models: the Dutch higher education system is modelled after the German Humboldtian university model (Charle 2004, 66); the Spanish higher education system found its origin in the French

Napoleonic university model (Charle 2004, 44-45) and the English higher education system is based on the Anglo-Saxon university model (Charle 2004, 54). I will also investigate if the characteristics of these different university traditions can be found in the implementation of the ENQA standards and guidelines for Quality assurance.

Moreover, the Bologna Process is an intergovernmental agreement and there is no legal obligation for the signatory states to implement the provisions. The Bologna Process is a political process of horizontal integration and is based on soft governance. National policies are coordinated by agreement at the European level, however, the different national governments try to remain in control of the implementation, the transformation into national context and the decision process. Formally speaking, the cooperation of states in the Bologna Process is not binding and voluntary, which means that it is without the legal consequences of conventional EU processes of hierarchical direction and supranational steering (Enders and Westerheijden 2014, 170). This means that states have a lot of freedom when deciding upon the way to implement the quality assurance standards and guidelines. Therefore, I would also like to investigate if the outcome of the implementation of the ESG is comparable in these three states. I formulated the following research question: How are the ENQA standards and guidelines for quality assurance implemented in the Netherlands, Spain and England and is the outcome of this implementation process comparable for these three states? In the next chapter of this thesis the process of the harmonisation of quality assurance in Europe will be highlighted. This chapter will include an overview of the Standards and Guidelines of Quality Assurance as introduced by ENQA and will highlight some of the problems associated with the harmonisation of quality assurance. I decided to focus my research on the compliance of national quality assurance agencies with ENQA external quality assurance standards and ENQA external quality assurance standards for agencies (part two and three of the ENQA report on European standards and guidelines) since compliance with internal quality assurance ESG is different for each higher education institution and therefore harder to investigate per state. Nevertheless, features of the national education systems and their higher education legislation related to internal quality assurance will be mentioned when possible.

The third chapter of this thesis will give a short overview of the Dutch higher education system and will show how the quality assurance standards and guidelines are implemented in the national higher education legislation. Furthermore, it will highlight the work of the national agency for quality assurance, the ‘Nederlands-Vlaamse Accreditatieorganisatie’ (NVAO) which monitors the quality of higher education in the Netherlands. The fourth chapter contains a summary of the Spanish higher education system and will reflect upon the measures taken by the Spanish government in order to implement the ESG. Moreover, this chapter will show how the Spanish national quality assurance agency, the ‘Agencia Nacional de Evaluación de la Calidad y Acreditación’ (ANECA), supervises the quality of higher education in Spain. The fifth chapter outlines the English higher education system

(7)

7 and investigates how the Standards and Guidelines for Quality Assurance are implemented by the government and the national quality assurance agency, the ‘Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education’ (QAA). In this thesis both the terms ‘United Kingdom’ and ‘England’ are used. Although the higher education systems of the four different UK nations are very similar, some differences do exist. Therefore it is not always possible to investigate the UK as a whole. Since 80% of the higher education institutions of the United Kingdom are in England, this research will focus on the situation in England. If the term ‘United Kingdom’ or ‘British’ is used this means that the described situation is applicable to all UK nations.

In the sixth chapter the national legislation related to quality assurance is compared. In addition, compliance of the three agencies to the ESG is reviewed. For this comparison reports from ENQA published after external reviews of the national quality assurance agencies are used. In addition, this thesis contains an appendix. In this appendix the features of national higher education legislation and the compliance to the ESG of the three investigated states and their quality assurance agencies are stated in more detail. The appendix gives a better and different overview of the differences and similarities between the states because the features are compared in tables. Due to lack of space chapter six only includes the most important features of legislation and compliance to the ESG and highlights the differences and similarities between the states.

Furthermore, the results of the analysis of the implementation of the Standards and Guidelines for Quality Assurance in the three states are compared. In the final chapter and conclusion the outcome of the implementation process of the ESG in the Netherlands, Spain and England will be compared. I will conclude if the implementation of the ESG has lead to more convergence regarding the quality assurance of education and if the introduction of the ESG will make the ideal of the Bologna Process of more comparable, compatible and coherent higher education systems a reality.

(8)

8

2. The Bologna Process and quality assurance

This chapter provides background to the process of harmonisation of quality assurance in Europe. The first paragraph gives an overview of the history of quality assurance in Europe and the

characteristics of quality assurance. In the second paragraph the ENQA standards and guidelines for quality assurance are explained. In the last paragraph of this chapter the difficulties related to the harmonisation of quality assurance in Europe are set out.

2.1 Quality assurance of higher education in Europe

Quality Assurance in higher education can be understood as ‘policies, procedures and practices that are designed to achieve, maintain, or enhance quality as it is understood in a specific context’ (Crosier and Parveva 2013, 42). Under the influence of the ‘new public management’ idea, the ideology of many European states changed in the recent decades from the welfare state idea to the idea that the state had to intervene whenever this might be beneficial for the population. This discussion also affected higher education (Westerheijden 2007, 75). Quality assurance became an important topic on the higher education agenda of many different European states around the 1980s and 1990s. This rising interest was due to a combination of factors. One of the reasons was the large fiscal limitations many states had to deal with during a time of recession, which prevented a further growth of the higher education budget. Furthermore, higher education was given a large variety of functions in the emerging knowledge economies of Europe, while the massification of higher education caused that traditional policy tools, such as regulation and line-item budgeting, were no longer sufficient for national governments to control their higher education sector (Enders and Westerheijden 2014, 168).

The European Union began to expand its interest in higher education beyond facilitating mobility and opening the European labour markets in 1992 with the Maastricht Treaty. From this moment on, the European level has played a big role in quality assurance for education (Enders and Westerheijden 2014, 168). The Bologna Declaration of 19June 1999 states the ‘promotion of European co-operation in quality assurance with a view to developing comparable criteria and methodologies’ (EHEA 1999, 4). The objective of the creation of criteria and methodologies to evaluate the quality of higher education in a comparable way also fosters and supports the development of staff and student mobility between higher education institutions in Europe (Edwards, Tovar Caro and Sánchez-Ruiz 2009, 1).

Quality assurance began to play an ever increasing role in the Bologna Process. In 2001, it was stressed in the Declaration of Prague that the quality of higher education should be an ‘important determinant of Europe’s international attractiveness and competitiveness’ (Edwards, Tovar Caro and Sánchez Ruíz 2009, 2). Two years later, in the Berlin communiqué of September 2003, the ministers of education stated that the quality of higher education is at the heart of the establishment of the EHEA and that national quality assurance systems need to include a definition of responsibilities within institutions and the groups involved in carrying them out (Kettunen and Kantola 2007, 67). In this communiqué a twin mandate was given to the European Network for Quality Assurance (ENQA) to develop ‘an agreed set of standards, procedures and guidelines on quality assurance’ and ‘to explore ways of ensuring an adequate peer review system for quality assurance and/ or accreditation agencies or bodies’ (ENQA 2009, 6).

(9)

9 Evaluation in the context of quality assurance can be either external or internal. The difference between these types of evaluation is that external evaluation is usually carried out by a group of external experts, inspectors or peers who will report directly to a local, regional or central education authority, while internal evaluation is carried out under the responsibility of the people working in the educational institution themselves, which means they can be directly involved in the institution (European Encyclopaedia on National Education Systems 2011). According to Newton (2007, 16) the difference between external and internal quality assurance highlights two different approaches: external quality assurance is focused on accountability and assurance, while internal quality assurance is focussed on quality improvement or enhancement.

According to a study of Voegtle, Knill and Dobbins (2011, 90) the introduction of quality assurance as a goal of the Bologna process has caused more convergence in quality assurance measures in the EHEA by the adoption of QA measures according to Bologna standards. Through the Bologna process many participating states have established an external quality assurance system. Prior to this process only few states had established such a system. The establishment of these systems has shifted the supervision on higher education institutions from government supervision to supervision by quality assurance agencies. Through the increasing communications between governments, agencies and other actors involved in quality assurance, increased convergence towards a particular model of external quality assurance can be seen (Crosier and Parveva 2013, 46).

2.2 ENQA Standards and Guidelines for Quality Assurance

In order to assist the national higher education systems with the implementation of quality assurance, ENQA drafted a report on the Standards and Guidelines of Quality assurance for the European Ministers of Education at the Bergen ministerial conference in 2005. In this report they recommended that there will be European standards for internal and external quality assurance and for external quality assurance agencies. Furthermore, they reported that European quality assurance agencies are expected to undergo a cyclical review within 5 years and that a European register of quality assurance agencies will be established, with a European Register Committee as a gatekeeper for the inclusion of agencies in the register. Reviews should be undertaken nationally when possible, because of the emphasis on subsidiarity (Edwards, Tovar Caro and Sánchez Ruíz 2009, 4).

The standards and guidelines consist of European standards for internal and external quality assurance and European standards for external quality assurance agencies. The standards from this report are not meant to imply standardisation or requirements but are meant as short and general statements of basic good practice. The guidelines provide additional information and explain the importance of the standards. There purpose is to illustrate the standard. The standards and guidelines are generic and not specific and are meant to serve as a source of assistance and

guidance; they do present a view of what should be done, without mentioning how it should be done (Williams n.d.).

Furthermore, the standards and guidelines in the report are presented in three different parts. The first part of the list of ESG consists of guidelines for internal quality assurance within higher

education institutions. The summary list of ESG contains the following standards and guidelines for internal quality assurance within higher education institutions:

(10)

10

 1.1 Policy and procedures for quality assurance:

All institutions should have a policy and associated procedures for quality assurance and have standards for their programmes and awards. Furthermore, they should commit themselves to the development of a culture which recognizes the importance of quality and quality assurance in their work. This can be achieved by the development and implementation of a strategy for the continuous enhancement of quality. The developed strategy, policy and procedures should have a formal status, should be publicly available and they should also include a role for students and other stakeholders (ENQA 2009, 7).

 1.2 Approval, monitoring and periodic review of programmes and awards:

All higher education institutions should create formal mechanisms for the approval, monitoring and periodic review of their programmes and awards (ENQA 2009, 7).

 1.3 Assessment of students:

Students need to be assessed by using published criteria, procedures and regulations, which should be applied consistently (ENQA 2009, 7).

 1.4 Quality assurance of teaching staff:

The staff involved with teaching should be qualified and competent to do so and institutions should have ways to make sure this is the case. Furthermore, these ways should be available to those who undertake external reviews and should be commented upon in reports (ENQA 2009, 7).

 1.5 Student support and learning resources:

It should be ensured by institutions that the resources available for the support of student learning are appropriate and adequate for the programmes offered (ENQA 2009, 7).

 1.6 Information systems:

Education institutions need to ensure that they collect, analyse and use relevant information for the effective management of their study programmes and other activities (ENQA 2009, 7).

 1.7 Public information:

Both quantitative and qualitative, objective and impartial information about the programmes and awards offered should be published regularly by institutions (ENQA 2009, 7).

This research has been focused on the compliance of national quality assurance agencies with ENQA external quality assurance standards and ENQA external quality assurance standards for agencies (part two and three of the ENQA report on European standards and guidelines). As every institution can implement the international quality assurance standards according to their wishes, it is hard to compare the implementation of these standards in different states. Even within states large differences in the degree of compliance with these standards can exist between different

institutions. Nevertheless, some of the features of the national education system and their higher education legislation related to internal quality assurance will be mentioned when possible. The second part of the report on standards and guidelines for quality assurance contains European standards for the external quality assurance of higher education. The summary list contains the following standards:

 2.1 Use of internal quality assurance procedures:

The effectiveness of the internal quality assurance processes as described in part one should be taken into account by the external quality assurance procedures (ENQA 2009, 8).

(11)

11

 2.2 Development of external quality assurance processes:

All those responsible for quality assurance, including higher education institutions, should develop and determine the aims and objectives of quality assurance processes before the processes themselves are developed. These aims and objectives should be published with a description of the procedures to be used (ENQA 2009, 8).

 2.3 Criteria for decisions:

Formal decisions that are made as a result of an external quality assurance activity should be based on consistently applied criteria which are published explicitly (ENQA 2009, 8).

 2.4 Processes fit for purpose:

The external quality assurance processes should be designed to ensure their fitness to achieve the aims and objectives set for them (ENQA 2009, 8).

 2.5 reporting:

All commendations, decisions and recommendations contained in report should be easy to find for a reader and the reports should be written and published in a clear and readily accessible style (ENQA 2009, 8).

 2.6 follow-up procedures:

All quality assurance processes which require a subsequent action plan or which contain recommendations should have a predetermined follow-up procedure which is implemented consistently (ENQA 2009, 8).

 2.7 Periodic reviews:

The external quality assurance of institutions and/or programmes needs to be undertaken on a cyclical basis, of which the length of the cycle and the review procedures should be clearly defined and published in advance (ENQA 2009, 8).

 2.8 System-wide analyses:

Summary reports need to be produced from time to time by quality assurance agencies. These reports should describe and analyse the general findings or their evaluations, reviews and assessments ENQA 2009, 8).

The third part of the report on standards and guidelines on quality assurance in higher education contains the European standards for external quality assurance agencies:

 3.1 Use of external quality assurance procedures for higher education:

The presence and effectiveness of the external quality assurance processes as stated in part two of the report on standards and guidelines should be taken into account by the external quality assurance of agencies (ENQA 2009, 9).

 3.2 Official status:

The competent public authorities in the European Higher Education Area should formally

recognize agencies as agencies with responsibilities for external quality assurances. The agencies should have an established legal basis and should comply with any requirements of the

legislative jurisdictions within which they operate (ENQA 2009, 9).

 3.3 Activities:

External quality assurance activities should be undertaken by agencies at institutional or programme level on a regular basis (ENQA 2009, 9).

(12)

12

 3.4 resources:

In order to run their external quality assurance in an effective and efficient manner, agencies need to have adequate and proportional resources. They should have appropriate provision for the development of their procedures and processes (ENQA 2009, 9).

 3.5 Mission statement

All agencies should have a publicly available statement which contains their clear and explicit goals and objectives for their work (ENQA 2009, 9).

 3.6 Independence:

All agencies should be independent and have autonomous responsibility for their operations and the conclusions and recommendations made in their reports cannot be influenced by third parties, such as ministries, higher education institutions or other stakeholders (ENQA 2009, 9).

 3.7 External quality assurance criteria and processes used by the agencies

All the criteria, processes and procedures that are used by agencies should be publicly available and pre-defined. The processes should normally include: a self-assessment or equivalent procedure by the subject of the quality assurance process, an external assessment by a group of experts which includes student members and site visits as decided by the agency, the publication of a report which included any decisions, recommendations or other formal outcomes and ‘a follow-up procedure to review actions taken by the subject of the quality assurance process in the light of any recommendations contained in the report’ (ENQA 2009, 9).

 3.8 Accountability procedures:

Agencies need to have procedures for their own accountability (ENQA 2009, 9).

The ENQA report also states that a European register of quality assurance agencies will be produced. In 2008 the European Quality Assurance Register for Higher Education (EQAR) was launched at the request of the European ministers of education at the Bergen (2005) and London (2007) ministerial conferences. The EQAR is a register for external quality assurance agencies that ‘have demonstrated their substantial compliance with a common set of principles for quality assurance in Europe’ (EQAR n.d.). Quality assurance agencies have to demonstrate their compliance with the ESG through an external review by independent experts in order to be admitted to the register. The register has been established with several objectives. First of all, it aims to promote student mobility by ‘providing a basis for the increase of trust among higher education institutions’ (EQAR n.d.). In addition, the register reduces the opportunities for so called ‘accreditation mills’ to gain credibility and provides a basis for national governments to authorize higher education institutions to make a choice between any of the agencies from the registers, if this is compatible with their national arrangements, while it also provides a means for the higher education institutions to choose between the different agencies in the register. Furthermore, the register serves as an instrument to improve the quality of the different agencies and promotes mutual trust between them (EQAR n.d.).

ENQA and EQAR do have similar missions and functions, but there are also some differences between their objectives. EQAR’s objective is more focused on the enhancement of trust and confidence by the management of a list of approved QA agencies and the provision of clear and reliable information on QA agencies. Furthermore, EQAR promotes the mutual acceptance of quality assurance decisions. In comparison, ENQA wishes to contribute to the maintenance and

enhancement of quality of higher education in Europe and aims to act as a driving force for the development of quality assurance in the member states of the EHEA. Both organisations examine

(13)

13 and judge the compliance of quality assurance agencies with the ESG. In order to qualify for EQAR membership, substantial compliance with the ESG is required (ENQA 2011, 9-10). Some respondents to an ENQA consultation of quality assurance agencies said that this difference in use of the criteria causes tension, and the respondents claim to prefer the ESG to be used as a reference tool, which was their original intention, instead of being used as a compliance tool (ENQA 2011, 17).

2.3 Difficulties related to the harmonisation of quality assurance in Europe

The creation of a set of standards, procedures and guidelines that can be agreed upon by all

signatories of the Bologna Process raises a number of questions and is not without problems. Firstly, ‘quality assurance’ is a very generic term which lends itself to many interpretations. There is not one single definition that covers all circumstances (ENQA 2009, 12). The same applies to the word ‘standards’, this term is employed in different ways across Europe. The definition of the word ‘standards’ varies from state to state and ranges from statements of narrowly defined regulatory requirements to more generalized descriptions of good practice (ENQA 2009, 12). Because of this difference in the view on important terms there are also some issues on the clarity of the ESG and issues around the terminology and interpretation of language and concepts. According to a

consultation of ENQA, these differences are the result of the different views of stakeholders and of differences in institutional and national contexts. For example, terms such as ‘student involvement’ or ‘student participation’ can lead to different interpretations. (ENQA 2011, 19).

Secondly, even within the community of quality assurance, there are some fundamental differences of view on what is an appropriate relationship between higher education institutions and their external evaluators. Most agencies that accredit institutions and programmes view external quality assurance as a matter of ‘consumer protection’, which requires a clear distance to be established between the quality assurance agency and the institution whose work they access. However, some agencies see it as their principal purpose of external quality assurance to be the supplier of guidance and advice in order to help the institutions improve the standards and quality of their study

programmes and qualifications. This view does require a closer relationship between the institution and the quality assurance agency. Furthermore, there are also agencies that prefer to have a position somewhere in between in order to balance accountability and improvement (ENQA 2009, 12). Thirdly, the higher education institutions and student representative bodies do not always have the same views and interests. Higher education institutions normally seek a high level of autonomy without much external evaluation or regulation. The interests of the student representative bodies are opposite of those of the higher education institutions, they want their higher education

institutions to be publicly accountable through frequent inspection at the level of the qualification or programme in order to assure the quality of their education (ENQA 2009, 12).

Fourthly, the establishment of a comparable system of external quality assurance raises difficulties. Currently almost all Bologna signatories have established such a system. Most states have either one or more independent agencies which are charged with prime responsibility, although most agencies have only been established more recently or after the beginning of the Bologna Process.

Nonetheless, there are big and significant differences in the approaches and objectives of the existing systems. One of the differences is whether the quality assurance focus of the system is on

institutions or programmes or on both. A second important difference is whether the quality assurance agency is vested with the power to grant institutions or programmes permission to

(14)

14 operate. This can be complicated by the features of some national systems, for example, some governments retain the power to issue degrees at central level (Crosier and Parveva 2013, 43). Despite the improvements that have been made by the establishment of external quality assurance systems in many states there are some remaining challenges. Firstly, the fact that many external quality assurance systems fail to take a holistic view of quality often makes student services to be a neglected key issue. Secondly, participation of key stakeholders such as employers needs to be improved and reforms are needed in order to make sure students can participate systematically in all relevant processes. Thirdly, most states do not allow their higher education institutions to be

evaluated by agencies from outside their country (Crosier and Parveva 2013, 46). Many states remain reluctant to devolve the responsibility for external quality assurance beyond their national

boundaries (EACEA, 2012, 70).

The quality assurance policy goals rising from the Bologna Process are set in transnational settings, which means that they require different kinds of negotiations and strategies. International influences are more likely to find their way into national policies persuasively instead of authoritatively. This emphasizes the local (institutional) level over the national level. The decisions written in declarations and communiqués are born from negotiations and discussions, since policy actors have no European decision-making powers or authority (Saarinen 2005, 189). The implementation of higher education policy can be influenced by various international, national and local factors (Saarinen 2005, 190). One of the largest problems regarding higher education policy in Europe is the fact that contestations take place between national policies, supranational European policies and intergovernmental policies about their political authority and also about the main principles guiding the course of action. Nation states have always defended education as a policy area within their own sovereignty by arguing that education was the main vehicle to transmit their national values and national culture (Enders and Westerheijden 2014, 168). In 1998 the Ministers in charge of education of France, Italy, Germany and the United Kingdom chose to sign the Sorbonne Declaration as an intergovernmental agreement instead of using the supranational EU institutions to coordinate the process. According to Enders and Westerheijden (2014, 169), there are two main reasons why the signatories of the Sorbonne

declaration, of which the Bologna Process emerged, chose not to use the EU as the channel to reform their higher education policies.

The first reason mentioned is the fact that the EU had no official competence in education. The scope for action on education of the EU has been limited by the formulation of the subsidiarity principle in the Maastricht Treaty. The inclusion of the subsidiarity principle means that all policy areas that could be handled at member state level should not be handled at EU level. The field of education is one of the policy areas that is considered to be handled best at member state level (Enders and Westerheijden 2014, 169).

The second reason mentioned by Enders and Westerheijden (2014, 169) is the fact that Germany, France and Italy believed that involvement of the EU would have caused too much delay. These three states experiences some trouble while trying to reform their national higher education system and believed that the signing of this intergovernmental agreement would be a ‘window of opportunity’ to increase the needed pressure for action back home. Furthermore, their experience in other policy areas showed that the EU procedures would take years, since they require consultation with all the different member states, committees and councils. Moreover, they believed that the involvement of

(15)

15 the EU would end in compromise policies and Germany, France and Italy presumed that these

policies would not be as effective as a lever for national reform (Enders and Westerheijden 2014, 169).

All these factors combined make the establishment of a common quality assurance framework very complicated. Many differences exist in the attitudes of all parties involved, such as states, quality assurance agencies, higher education institutions and their stakeholders. Furthermore, states are not willing to give up part of their sovereignty on education which causes any step towards

harmonization to be made at intergovernmental level. In the following chapters the attitudes towards quality assurance of three different states, the Netherlands, Spain and England, and their national quality assurance agencies will be investigated.

(16)

16

3. Quality assurance of higher education in the Netherlands

This chapter provides an overview of the Dutch higher education sector and the Dutch quality

assurance system. Firstly, the history of the Dutch education system and its origin in the Humboldtian university model will be discussed. Secondly, recent changes in higher education policy and the current higher education system are highlighted. In the second section of the chapter the Dutch quality assurance system will be explained and the legislation regarding quality assurance will be reviewed.

3.1 Overview of the education system and higher education policy in the

Netherlands

3.1.1 History of the higher education system in the Netherlands

The first university in the Netherlands was founded in 1575 in Leiden. This university was established as a reward for the persistence of the inhabitants of Leiden while fighting against Spain in the 80 year war (de Weert and Boezerooy 2007, 11-12). Several other universities were established in the larger Dutch cities in the following centuries. The brutal policies of Napoleon had a big impact on the universities in the beginning of the 19th century. By 1815 only the universities of Leiden, Utrecht and Groningen remained. Nonetheless, these universities never fully absorbed the French university system. In 1815 King William I limited the status of full state universities to the three remaining universities but permitted the re-establishment of universities without the right to award doctorates in the Dutch provinces without universities. These institutions were called Athenaea. However, in 1876 they were closed and their institutions were fully recognized as universities. The possession of a full range of faculties was the new criteria in order to be recognized as a university instead of the right to award doctorates. In 1848 the constitution was reformed which permitted the foundation of private universities under state supervision. After these legislative changes many of the current universities were established (Charle 2004, 39). In the next centuries additional universities were founded. Some of the newly founded universities were part of an explicit economic government policy to further activity in disadvantages regions, such as the University of Twente in 1961 and the University of Limburg in 1976 (De Weert and Boezerooy 2007, 11-12).

Dutch universities have predominately been formed by the German university model named after the German scholar Wilhelm von Humboldt. In 1810 Humboldt founded a university in Berlin which was built on the ideas of the philosopher Friedrich Schleiermacher. According to the Humboldt University model the function of the university was:

‘not to pass on recognized and directly usable knowledge (...) but rather to demonstrate how this knowledge is discovered, in order to stimulate the idea of science in the minds of the students, to encourage them to take account of the fundamental laws of science in all their thinking’

(Schleiermacher 1808, as cited in Wissema 2009, 13).

Because of this underlying philosophy we can characterize the relationship between the universities and the authorities by freedom. In Humboldt’s model there were only two tasks to fulfil for the state with regard to the universities: the state had to protect the universities’ freedom and had to appoint professors (Rüegg 2004, 5). The Humboldt university model emphasized the importance of research for the teaching of the professor. It also introduced the replacement of lectures by seminars. These

(17)

17 seminars were meant to encourage a research-based study for students preparing to start their professional careers. Another important feature of the German university model, which promoted the renewal of scholarship, was the institution of Privatdozenten or private lectures, from whom the professors were recruited (Charle 2004, 48-49). The Dutch took over the German university model in terms of the linking of teaching to research, the introduction of seminars and the use of

Privatdozenten. However, the Dutch went their own way in the use of governing bodies to run the universities. Another important difference between the Dutch and German university system was the existence of centralized university legislation in the Netherlands, which also acknowledged the use of private universities. In Germany such legislation did not exist (Charle 2004, 66).

Until 1970 the university sector was left on its own by the Dutch government. The government believed this had to change because of a high rate of student drop out and the fact that the average length of study was rather long in the Netherlands compared to other states. Furthermore, a large part of the academic staff lacked the qualities and motivation needed to face the challenges the Dutch university sector had to cope with and the institutional management was seen as rather powerless, weak and not very professional. In order to make higher education more efficient and effective the ‘two tier structure’ was introduced, which resulted in the closure of several

departments, a change in the programmes offered and the introduction of a system of conditional funding of research (De Weert and Boezerooy 2007, 12).

3.1.2 Recent changes in Dutch higher education policy and the current situation

The current Dutch higher education system can be classified as a binary system which separates the university sector from the hbo sector, or higher professional education sector. (De Weert and Boezerooy 2007, 11). The main differences between university education and higher professional education are the part played by research and applied sciences and the historically rooted social status of their degrees (Frijhoff 1992, 492).

One of the distinctive features of the Dutch education system is that ‘it combines a centralized education policy with the decentralized administration and management of educational institutions’ Institutions of higher professional education and universities have different management structures (De Weert and Boezerooy 2007, 54). Furthermore, Dutch universities do not have the power to select their bachelor’s students and have to accept all students with sufficient qualifications. Only for some programmes with limited capacity there is a national lottery system in place when there is excess demand. For master’s programmes the universities do have the possibility to set selection criteria. According to some experts in the field, the fact that the Dutch higher education system is

characterized by open access causes the mediocre levels of graduation and a relatively high level of drop-out (Jongbloed 2008, 431). Universities are free to start new teaching programmes, but these programmes need to be accredited by the national accreditation agency and cannot duplicate existing programmes. If these requirements are not met, the programme will not receive public funding (CHEPS 2010a, 64-65).

The most important legislation for higher education in the Netherland is the Higher Education and Research Act which entered into force on 1 August 1993. This act ‘redefined the administrative relationship between the government and the higher education and research institutions. Previous legislation provided to a large extent for ex ante regulation and planning, assigning a central role to the government’ (De Weert and Boezerooy 2007, 13). The new act was based on the 1985 policy

(18)

18 document ‘Autonomy and Quality in Higher Education’. In this policy document a philosophy of hands-off government and autonomous educational institutions is set out. In order to enable the higher education system to respond more effectively to the changing society, the institutions are given greater freedom of policy and freedom of programming, within the parameters laid down by the government. The government will only intervene when necessary and the ex-ante control is replaced by ex post control of a more general nature. Nonetheless, despite the decentralisation, the government remains responsible for the macro-efficiency of the system (De Weert and Boezerooy 2007, 13). The 1993 Act codified enhanced institutional autonomy and included the introduction of the principle of self-regulation for higher education institutions (Jongbloed, 2010, 418).

One of the most important shifts in governance in the Dutch higher education sector is the increased importance of the central institutional management. This increase was necessary in order for Dutch universities to be successful in a more competitive world (Jongbloed 2010, 419). In 1997 an

adaptation of the national law on education changed the internal governance structures. Executive leadership positions were strengthened and power became more concentrated because the

selection mechanisms for executive positions were changed to a system of top-down appointments. This meant that representative bodies for staff and students became mere advisory-bodies instead of making bodies. The academic departments or vakgroepen also lost many of their decision-making powers (CHEPS 2010a, 65). Other important changes in Dutch higher education after the Act of 1993 were the establishment of the National Accreditation Council (NVAO), the transfer of the economic ownership of university buildings to the universities themselves and the decentralization of human resources policy (Jongbloed 2010, 421). Moreover, according to research by the European University Association (EUA) the biggest reforms undertaken in the Netherlands since 2000 are reforms in the university funding system and reforms in quality assurance (Sursock and Smidt 2010, 16).

In 2002 the Netherlands also implemented the Bachelor-Master structure of the Bologna declaration and the European Credit Transfer System (ECTS). Every ECTS implies 28 hours of study in the

Netherlands. The implementation of the Bachelor-Master structure substitutes the traditional Dutch programmes by which a title of doctorandus, ingenieur or meester can be obtained by a bachelor’s programme of three years consisting of 180 ECTS after which students can go on to enter a

specialized master’s programme of 1 or 2 years. Students from universities of applied sciences will be awarded a bachelor’s degree after 4 years of study and completing 240 ECTS (de Weert and

Boezerooy 2007, 16). This difference in the length of the bachelor’s programme at the different types of institutions was justified by the different length of prior secondary education: access to

universities of applied sciences is granted after 5 years of secondary school education whereas access to universities is granted after 6 years of secondary school education. It has been questioned

whether it was possible to maintain the Dutch two tier system when implementing the Bachelor-Master structure. However, the Dutch Minister responsible for education insisted that the differentiation was necessary in order to match students’ prior education and the needs of the labour market. He also stressed that the Bologna Process was not about the harmonisation of higher education in Europe, but about improving the comparability of existing systems (Witte 2006, 119; 221).

(19)

19

3.2 The implementation of quality assurance in higher education in the

Netherlands

3.2.1 The quality assurance system in the Netherlands

In the 1980s the Netherlands was one of the leaders in the field of quality assurance in higher education. In the Dutch quality assurance system the government would check afterwards (on ex post basis) if the outputs of the higher education system were acceptable and if funds were deployed effectively. Institutions had a lot of autonomy, but had to ‘deliver’ quality education. In the Dutch quality assurance framework the entity to be evaluated is the higher education institution and the programme of study, in other words, the collection of courses leading to a bachelor’s or master’s degree. If shortcomings were identified through the quality assessment, the government can use coercive powers backed up by sanctions (Weert and Boezerooy 2007, 14; 65-67). The two tier system in the Netherlands causes slight differences between the quality assurance procedures for hbo and wo programmes. The hbo programmes are more ‘practice oriented’, therefore, the applicability and job orientation of the programme have a higher priority for the quality judgements (Weert and Boezerooy 2007, 65-67).

In 2004, the Nederlands-Vlaamse accreditatie organisatie (NVAO) was founded in order to ensure and promote the quality of higher education in the Netherlands and Flanders. The NVAO determines whether a programme meets basic quality standards based on an independent assessment process. Accreditation is mandatory for all study programmes in order to award recognized degrees, to make students eligible for student grants and loans and for the programme to receive state funding. (Weert and Boezerooy 2007, 70-71). As of 2011 a new accreditation system was introduced in the Netherlands based on institutional audit in combination with (initial) programme accreditation. The purpose of this institutional audit is to determine whether the institution’s management, from its view on quality of education, maintains an effective system of quality assurance in order to guarantee the quality of the programmes offered (NVAO, n.d). In the case that an institution does not want to participate or fails this audit the institution’s programmes will be assessed based on the ‘extensive programme assessment framework’, which is similar to the former programme

assessment framework. Furthermore, the NVAO makes all accreditation decisions for existing programmes (ENQA, 2012a, 6-7).

3.2.2 Implementation of quality assurance in Dutch legislation

The Dutch Higher Education and Research Act (WHW) includes very extensive provisions on quality assurance, including many provisions on internal quality assurance for institutions. This paragraph will highlight the most important legislative provision. A more detailed overview of the Dutch provisions regarding quality assurance of higher education can be found in the appendix. According to article 1.18 of the Higher Education and Research Act, the higher education institutions are responsible for the maintenance of the quality of their education. The Supervisory Board of an institution is also responsible for the monitoring of the establishment of a system of quality

assurance as mentioned in Article 1.18 WHW (Article 9.8 WHW). The Minister of Education, Culture and Science supervises that institutions carry out quality assurance activities.

The Dutch government only provides funding to accredited institutions according to article 1.9 of the Higher Education and Research Act. Funding for institutions depends on the number of students enrolled and their study results (article 2.6 WHW). The Dutch Ministers of Education, Culture and

(20)

20 Science can impose conditions on the funding of universities related to quality assurance (article 2.5 WHW). Official degrees can only be granted by funded and accredited institutions. Furthermore, Dutch legislation provides detailed provisions on course load and credits. Each credit equals 28 hours of study. Study programmes should be developed in such a way that it enables the student to obtain the amount of credits on which the course load is based (Article 7.4 WHW).

In addition, access to university is granted to each person in possession of the minimum required secondary school qualifications or equivalent (title 2 WHW). Higher education institutions need to ensure access to education and can only select their students if they offer a special track which aims at achieving a higher level of knowledge (Article 7.9.b WHW). Moreover, a ministerial regulation can fix a maximum number of placements for a certain study programme based on the needs of the labour market (Article 7.56 WHW).

Chapter 5a of the Higher Education and Research Act contains many provisions on the national accreditation body. A detailed overview of the provisions can be found in the appendix. For example, it includes provisions on the establishment and the tasks of the accreditation body NVAO, its financial resources and the appointment of its board members. Moreover, the chapter includes provisions on the specific criteria in need of evaluation for the accreditation of new or existing programmes, the content of reports written after accreditation of a programme, what needs to happen after a negative accreditation decision and many provisions on institutional audits.

The accreditation body NVAO is responsible for the accreditation of new and existing study programmes and the instellingstoets kwaliteitszorg, i.e. institutional audit. Higher education institutions can request the instellingstoets kwaliteitszorg (Article 5a.13a WHW). Furthermore, the agency establishes a commission of experts and a visitation commission for the different

accreditation procedures for new and existing study programmes. In addition, the accreditation body reports to the Minister about the quality of higher education and gives recommendations for the improvement of the quality of higher education. The accreditation body also discusses its

accreditation framework with other European states (Article 5a.2 WHW). Evaluation of the quality of the institution needs to be based on the judgement of students as well as the judgement of

independent experts. The results of the evaluation need to be publicly available (Article 1.18 WHW). This provision implements ENQA standard 3.7 on the criteria and processes used by agencies for quality assurance.

In addition, the Dutch higher education and Research Act implements many more of the ESG, such as standard 2.7 on periodic reviews, standard 3.2 on official status of the quality assurance agency, standard 3.3 on activities, standard 3.4 on resources and standard 3.6 on the independence of the quality assurance agency. The compliance of NVAO with these standards will be discussed in chapter 6.2.

The Dutch Higher Education and Research Act also includes other interesting provisions that are related to quality assurance. Before the end of the first academic year the board of the institution gives advice to each student about the continuation of his/her study programme. Depending on the study results and personal situation of the student the board can decide to terminate his enrolment for the study programme after the first year. The student cannot enrol for the same study

(21)

21 Another interesting feature of Dutch higher education is the Board of examinations. Every study programme or group of programmes has a board of examinations which examines if a student has met the requirements to obtain a degree (Article 7.12 WHW). At least one of the members needs to be part of the teaching staff of the study programme and one member needs to be independent from the study programme (Article 7.12a WHW). The board of examinations needs to guarantee the quality of the exams and needs to set the regulations (Onderwijs- en examenregeling, OER) to assess the results of examinations (Article 7.13b WHW). This OER sets, inter alia, the content of the study programme and the examinations, the workload for students and the qualities in terms of

knowledge, understanding and skills that students are expected to acquire by the end of the program. (Article 7.13 WHW)

(22)

22

4. Quality assurance of higher education in Spain

This chapter provides an overview of the Spanish higher education sector and the Spanish quality assurance system. Firstly, the history of the education system in Spain and its Napoleonic university model will be discussed. Secondly, recent changes in higher education policy and the current higher education system are highlighted. In the second section of the chapter the Spanish quality assurance system will be explained and the legislation regarding quality assurance will be reviewed.

4.1 Overview of the education system and higher education policy in Spain

4.1.1 History of the higher education system in Spain

Spain knows a long tradition of higher education. Its first universities in cities such as Salamanca, Valladolid and Toledo date back to the early thirteen century. Especially the 15th and 16th century are known as periods of splendour for the university and the acquisition of knowledge in Spain (Garcia Garrido 1992, 663). The modern Spanish universities have been formed on the model of the French académies. The French Napoleonic university model emerged in the first half of the 19th century and was built up from structures from the medieval period. It contains innovations from the 18th

centuries, for example the idea of specialist colleges, but most of all opened the university for all (Charle 2004, 44-45). This renewed university model had three main goals. The first goal was to make sure the post-revolutionary state had enough officials for political and social stabilization. The second goal was to ensure that the education of these officials ‘was carried out in harmony with the new social order and to prevent the emergence of new professional classes’ (Charle 2004, 45). The third goal of this university model was to impose limits on freedom of the intellect as it was believed that too much freedom could be dangerous to the state. The state had a monopoly in the awarding of academic degrees. This model was the opposite of the Prussian university model. Research and innovation were limited to the big teaching institutions or was going on outside the faculties, while the academic faculties of other universities were restricted to holding examinations for the

baccalaureate and giving lectures (Charle 2004, 45-46).

Although the Spanish policies after the liberation from Napoleon were mostly liberal and anti-French, the government’s attitude towards universities did not differ a lot from the Napoleonic model. In 1857 the government was given absolute control over the universities (Charle 2004, 46). Because of the centralizing tradition, old universities were gradually closed during the 19th century and only 10 universities remained at the head of school regions. However, the Spanish university scene suffered from the overwhelming influence from the university in the capital city of Madrid and the privileges this central university enjoyed. The University of Madrid was the only university which could award doctorates and only the universities of Madrid and Barcelona contained all faculties. According to the French model, the specialized technical colleges for state engineers were also located in Madrid (Charle 2004, 37).

In Spain we can still clearly see the Napoleonic relationship between university, government and society, since Spain interprets higher education as inseparable from the national community. This model saw ‘the individual establishment bonded into the national community by dint of close oversight exercised by a central ministry’ (Neave 2003, 144). A large part of the academic staff in Spanish universities have civil servant status and for a long time all the study programmes and their

(23)

23 core curriculum had to be approved by the central authorities (Betts and File 2010, 572). The

Napoleonic view of the role of the university in society emphasizes strong legal and administrative ties between the nation and the university, which is constructed around a national community (Neave 2003, 145).

4.1.2 Recent changes in Spanish higher education policy and the current situation

The Spanish constitution of 1978 establishes the autonomous regions and nationalities of Spain as the first level of government. The law on University Reform (Ley de reforma universitaria: LRU) of 1983 extended this principle of autonomy to the universities. This law also enunciated the principle of academic freedom. According to Neave (2012, 106), the LRU can be interpreted in two ways. Firstly, it can be interpreted as having modernized universities in Spain in order to adjust them to the pressures of social demand. Secondly, it can also be interpreted as ‘the first step in bringing the university world, which was hitherto grounded in a ‘Napoleonic’ model of central, national control, into alignment with the developing powers and responsibilities of the new autonomous

communities’ (Neave 2012, 106). In 2001 a new University Act was introduced which enhanced the responsibility of autonomous regions even further and gave them more independence to organize their higher education system and to create their own legal frameworks. Catalonia was the first autonomous region to make use of this opportunity and created the Act of Catalan higher education in 2003. The 2001 University Act also introduced the election of the rector by direct vote and an increase in academic staff in the collegial bodies, which reduced the high representation of students. Furthermore, the National Agency for Quality Assessment and Accreditation (ANECA) was established by this act (Betts and File 2010, 573-574).

We can clearly see two dimensions of participation regarding higher education institutions in Spain. Firstly, there is the participation within the institution, which can be seen through the recognition inter alia of the Student Estate on internal governing committees. Secondly, there is also

participation outside the institutions, which is caused by the strengthening of the responsibilities of the several autonomous communities within Spain for the institutions located within them. In the creation of the Social Council (Consejo Social) by the 2001 University Act, we can see that the revisions by the LRU centred on the internal bodies of governance (Neave 2012, 107). The Social Council was established to represent the wider interest of society in the university and is ‘the organ of participation of the society in the university’ (Betts and File 2010, 575). The Social Council supervises the economic activities of universities and the performance of its services, approves the university budget and the pluriannual programming of the university, which is proposed by the Governing Council. It also promotes the relation between the university and its professional, cultural and economic environment (Betts and File 2010, 575). This Social Council was composed of members from both the internal academic community and representatives of local social and political bodies and is externally chaired. The broader national strategy of administrative decentralization has caused the participation of external interest in the Spanish university sector to be strengthened (Neave 2012, 107). Universities were given a considerable amount of autonomy by the LRU in areas such as internal organisation, course and curriculum design, budgeting. Universities were also given the possibility to enter into research partnerships with private corporations. The presence of the Social Council had to counterbalance this institutional autonomy. The political autonomy existed in a state of tension between the institutional autonomy of universities and the autonomous communities (Neave 2012, 107). The influence of the Social Council is quite limited because of a lack of tradition and the unclear legal definition of its role (Betts and File 2010, 575).

(24)

24 According to research by the EUA the biggest reforms undertaken in Spain since 2000 are reforms in university autonomy and reforms in quality assurance (Sursock and Smidt 2010, 16). The most important recent changes in governance in the Spanish university sector have been made by the 2007 reform of the 2001 University Act (LOU). This reform made Spain move away from the national degrees with identical content for each field of study and gave the universities more freedom regarding curriculum design. Furthermore, some reforms have been made in the financing system of Spanish public universities. Currently the funding of public universities is based on three sources: public government subsidies provided by both the autonomous regions and the central state, tuition fees paid by the students and public and private funding for research activities and other services (Betts and File 2010, 576).

Some other interesting features of the Spanish higher education sector are the fact that universities have their freedom to define their policies in partnerships with enterprises. Only for partnerships with other higher education institutions ministerial approval is required. Regarding admission to the university, students apply for several programmes and can state a preference order. They are enrolled for a particular programme depending on the marks obtained for their secondary education exam. Universities can establish their own rules for selecting students. The regional authorities fix a number of study places available for each programme. Furthermore, universities are autonomous in hiring and selecting staff. Nonetheless, issues such as salaries and work conditions are regulated by the central government since professors and senior non-academic staff are civil servants belonging to national bodies (CHEPS 2010a, 80-81).

Spain, unlike the Netherlands, does not have a binary education system. Spanish universities offer both higher professional education and academic education. Spain does also differ between general higher education and special higher education. Higher education in arts is considered special higher education and is not part of the Higher Education Act (Nuffic 2012, 11). Higher education is

considered to be an equivalent term to university education in Spain (Betts and File 2010, 572). Higher education system in Spain changed drastically with the introduction of the Bachelor-Master system as a result of the Bologna declaration. The current Spanish university system uses the European Credit Transfer System (ECTS). One credit equals 25 to 30 hours of study. Before 2008 Spanish higher education contained three levels which could lead to different degrees. From 2008 on Spain has started to gradually replace the old degrees and diplomas with the new degree

programmes which are divided into three different stages: Estudios de Grado (4 years consisting of 240 ECTS, equivalent to a bachelor’s degree), Máster universitario (1-2 years, equivalent to a

master’s degree) and Doctorado (equivalent to a doctoral degree). A bachelor degree consists of 240 credits and lasts 4 year, which is longer than in some other European states (Nuffic 2012, 12-13).

4.2 The implementation of quality assurance in higher education in Spain

4.2.1 The quality assurance system in Spain

The ‘Agencia Nacional de Evaluación de la Calidad y Acreditación’ (ANECA) is the Spanish national quality assurance agency. ANECA was established in 2002 and the amendment to the Organic Law on Universities in 2007 gave it the status of a public state agency, subject to the provisions of the law on state agencies for the improvement of public services (ENQA, 2012b, 8). ANECA provides external quality assurance for the Spanish Higher Education System. ANECA’s aim is to contribute to the improvement of higher education through evaluation, certification and accreditation (ANECA, n.d.

Quality Assurance in the European Higher Education Area: a comparative study of the implementation of quality assurance standards and guidelines in the Netherlands, England and Spain