Accreditation Of Degrees Research Articles

What information professionals need to know: Job ads analysis

ABSTRACTA large number of ASIS&T members are involved in their academic programs' development, accreditation and assessment of academic degrees' offerings in relation to the professional market needs. The paper presents information about secondary sources of evidence regarding the library and information science professional market and argues that job advertisements offer rich data on desirable professional competencies and students' aspirations.

La educación superior en el MERCOSUR: la acomodación entre las políticas domésticas y la política regional

El trabajo analiza la especificidad de la política regional del MERCOSUR para la educación superior. Esta peculiaridad se puede explicar a partir de: las variadas maneras en que se intenta dar respuesta a las asimetrías estructurales y regulatorias de los complejos de educación superior, las diferentes culturas académicas y tradiciones universitarias presentes en cada país, las disímiles capacidades estatales en las carteras responsables de encaminar el proceso y las formas en que cada país procesa las tendencias internacionales sobre la educación superior. Se procede a un estudio de caso: la política de acreditación de la calidad de las titulaciones de grado en el MERCOSUR (1998-2012), que contó con una primera fase de carácter experimental entre los años 2002 y 2006 (Mecanismo Experimental de Acreditación de Carreras de Grado Universitario del MERCOSUR, Bolivia y Chile, MEXA) y devino, a mediados del 2008, en un sistema permanente (Sistema de Acreditación de Carreras Universitarias para el reconocimiento regional de la calidad académica de sus respectivas titulaciones en el MERCOSUR y Estados Asociados, ARCU-SUR).

Accreditation of biology degrees: Who needs it, and why now?

Are the skills of a student graduating from a biochemistry programme at university X equivalent to those graduating from the same programme at university Y? Probably not, but this is not an easy question to answer. Although minimum specifications for all biochemistry degree programmes are, in part, outlined by the Quality Assurance Agency (QAA), different universities have different entry requirements, can focus the degree they offer in a variety of different ways depending on their own expertise and can afford their students a whole host of different experiences – not necessarily better or worse experiences, but different. Additionally, of course, not all students are equal. Differences between individuals aside, graduate employers, from both academia and industry, are increasingly keen to know what they are likely to expect from a ‘typical’ graduate from a particular programme. Those of us working in the university sector know only too well how difficult it can be to find a PhD student who can hit the ground running on their project work. Can the accreditation of UK biology degrees help?

Monitoring of Official Degree Qualifications: The Key Role of Academic Quality Assurance Systems (AQAS)

The purpose of this article is focused on the development of a protocol designed to facilitate the monitoring process of the official degrees of a Spanish university. In response to the criteria and guidelines established in the Royal Decree 1393/2007, this proposal seeks to make available to the focus groups a useful and flexible tool, tailored to the different existing regulations, which assesses progress in the development of the curriculum, ensures the effective implementation of the degrees, and publishes the information available, relevant and appropriate. It also helps to identify weaknesses, potential improvements and best practices for dissemination. All this, with the ultimate aim of assuring the accreditation of Official Degrees. The monitoring protocol articulates the assessment, as a Check-List, in fulfillment of an annual series of indicators set out in the Academic Quality Assurance Systems (AQAS) included in the Proceedings of Degrees. Finally, the monitoring of new degrees comes up as a result of adaptation to the requirements of the European Higher Education Area.

Antecedents of brand trust in online tertiary education: a tri-nation study

Online education, which is centered on the use of the Internet and the World Wide Web, presents a new generation of educational tools. Its ‘anywhere, any time’ concept frees the student from the constraints of time and place. Because there are no barriers to information flow over the Internet, it holds promise for a ‘curriculum without walls’ where intellectual richness is available to all. To take advantage of the huge number of potential students worldwide, many universities and commercial education providers have moved rapidly to introduce online tertiary programs to get a share of this market. Online programs are now commonplace in many learning institutions. However, Internet-based education has not attracted as many students as had been expected. Specifically, online tertiary education has not attracted as many students as had been expected in Singapore (Gagnon, 2002; Tan & Lambe, 2002; Wong, Gerber, & Toh, 2003); Brunei (Leong, 2006); and Malaysia (Alhabshi, 2002). There is still a lack of confiden...

Engineering Education, Accreditation and the Bologna Declaration: A New Zealand View

This paper briefly describes professional engineering education in New Zealand concentrating on four year professional degrees. The role of the Institution of Professional Engineers (IPENZ) in the accreditation of degrees and as the national signatory of the Washington Accord is explained. The Bologna process and its implications for New Zealand are briefly considered in the context of the current situation. This leads to the conclusion that the rapid development of the Bologna process and the consequent need to reconcile and relate this to the Washington Accord standards may afford a timely opportunity for review and reform of engineering education in New Zealand and beyond.

'Accreditation' of engineering studies: Formal systems versus individual responsibility

The globalization of the world's economy (and its labour market) reveals a growing need for graduate mobility. In this free global market, educational institutions are under increased pressure to show their intrinsic value, to define and guarantee their quality and to show continually their relevance to their communities and national governments (often the main financial stakeholder). Accreditation of degrees (and institutions) by a recognized international authority (or by an international network of recognized national authorities) is often quoted as the solution to address the needs of mobility and quality assurance. I believe that the process of accreditation is not the fundamental answer to these needs. Accreditation in education can be a stabilizing factor in a small-scale economical system, but it fails on a large (global) scale. The reason for this is that any accreditation scheme judges quality in an arbitrary way. The key to opening up free mobility of competencies and to leveraging quality education is to develop a system to measure objectively an individual's competence. A system that makes the abstract notion of 'competence' tangible to anyone, but that leaves the judgement open to the ones who need to judge…

European Engineering Formation: The Problem of Trans-national Recognition

SUMMARY The need for an international, or at least European, system of recognition of academic and professional qualifications increases as the professional job market becomes more and more international. On the contrary, no widely accepted European system exists at present, not even in engineering, although in this field the situation appears more advanced than in others, thanks to the comparatively great international experience and exchanges in the academic and professional worlds. Thus, notwithstanding a European Community Directive of 1989 that intended to make easy the trans-national mobility of all professionals, and the 1997 ‘Convention on the Recognition of Qualifications Concerning Higher Education in the European Region’ promoted by the Council of Europe and UNESCO, international exchanges and mobility still encounter difficulties, due partly to long-standing prejudices, but also to insufficient mutual knowledge of the different national systems and significance of the degrees awarded. This paper summarizes briefly the present situation in the European Union with regard to recognition and accreditation of engineering degrees and qualifications, illustrates the actions undertaken by Working Group 2 of the EU-supported Thematic Network ‘Higher Engineering Education for Europe’, and advances a tentative proposal with regard to the gradual, bottom-up establishment of a system for mutual recognition and accreditation of degrees and professional qualifications in engineering.

Problems confronting migrants and members of their families when they return to their country of origin.

The problems which migrants and their families face when they return to their own country arise from the personal circumstances of the individuals themselves as well as the characteristics of both the country of origin and the host country. A great variety of conflicts can arise during reintegration and the interrelation between them is complex. Nevertheless, some problems occur more frequently than others; a number of the most common include the following: 1) reintegrating the return migrant into the labor force is very difficult, particularly when unemployment is a problem in his homeland. 2) Degrees earned abroad often do not transfer from one high school or university to another at the same academic level. 3) Most returning migrant workers lose their retirement benefits acquired during the period of emigration because of no social security convention between the countries concerned. 4) Patriotic feelings and ties to family and friends lead the migrant to gloss over the real problems he faces. 5) Migrant children commonly face problems related to education because of differences between languages, teaching contents, and educational methods practiced in the two countries. Recommendations to relieve these and other problems migrants face upon reintegration include: 1) efforts should be made to orient return migration when jobs are available; 2) cultural agreements allowing recognition of studies and accreditation of degrees and diplomas should be promoted; 3) social security conventions between countries should be extended to include the transfer of benefits and recognition of years of work; 4) priority should be given to educational problems faced by migrant children with a dual sociocultural identity; and 5) assistance should be given to countries in carrying out empirical studies on reintegration problems and measures to solve them.