EURASHE - European Association of Institutions in Higher Education

Newsletter July-August 2010 - N° 4

In this Issue
EURASHE - WHO ARE WE
EURASHE Stakeholders Events
Quick Links
Join Our List
Editorial
 


Dear Reader

 

In a final Newsletter before the summer break I can only be brief. Looking forward to a period with more time for ourselves, apart from a few latest news items and reminders of events announced earlier on, the main topic in this Summer 2010 Newsletter is our upcoming Annual Conference in Tallinn (Estonia), 14-15 October. 

 

The above link contains latest updates on this event, which again will provide a platform for receiving latest information on Higher Education trends and for discussion, debates and collaboration in the thematic workshops. At the same time it is a Celebration of two decades of EURASHE involvement in HE policy development, as the programme shows.

We are very much looking forward to welcoming you there, and with the summer break in between this and further communication about this event, we have decided to extend the early bird registration till 15 September.  

 

The EURASHE Secretariat closes on 19 July next, and we resume our official activities as from Monday 16 August. Electronic Communications will be dealt with via the eurashe@eurashe.eu email address till 24 July, and you can continue reaching your individual respondents in EURASHE via their own email address till the same date.

 

On behalf of the same Secretariat I wish you all the best of summer holidays.

 

Stefan Delplace

Secretary General

 

EURASHE - WHO WE ARE

European Association of Institutions in Higher Education

 

EURASHE is the association of Polytechnics, University Colleges, Universities of Applied Science etc. devoted to Professional Higher Education. EURASHE is an umbrella non-profit international organization with more than 800 members in more than 30 countries in the European Higher Education Area and outside of it through partnership agreements. Our members are National Associations of University Colleges, Individual Higher Education Institutions, professional associations & stakeholder organizations. EURASHE's main objective is to defend the interests of the professionally oriented Higher Education Institutions, and to continuously enhance the importance and the quality of professional higher education in Europe. EURASHE aims at contributing to the progressive development of the European Higher Education Area, especially through its active involvement as a consultative member of the Bologna Follow-up Group.

Read more about EURASHE. 
 
EURASHE
Stakeholders events 
 


EQAF call for contributions for their upcoming Fifth European Quality Assurance Forum (EQAF 2010)

Building Bridges: Making Sense of QA in European, National and Institutional Contexts

Call Deadline: 26 July 2010

Following the success of previous fora, we are pleased to announce that the 5th European Quality Assurance Forum will be hosted by the University Claude Bernard Lyon I, in Lyon, France, on 18-20 November 2010.

Specifically, the forum will be of interest to rectors and vice-rectors responsible for QA, QA officers in higher education institutions, students, QA agency staff, and researchers working on higher education or the QA field.

The 2010 Forum will seek to examine how quality assurance tools and processes implemented at institutional and agency level:
- relate to European and national level policy discussions and decisions, and
- interact with and support institutional quality frameworks and quality culture

Through plenary and parallel sessions, the discussion will focus on the grass root level of quality assurance in the context of the ongoing development of the European Higher Education Area.

Call to submit a contribution

EQAF invites contributions for their upcoming event from QA practitioners in higher education institutions and quality assurance agencies, students, institutional leaders and researchers in the field. The forum is an excellent opportunity to test current practices or research and to elicit feedback from colleagues and stakeholders. Therefore, all contributions are expected to seek to stimulate a discussion with forum participants.

The deadline to submit all contributions is 26 July 2010. Proposals received after this date will not be considered.

For more information on how to submit a contribution, the call for papers can be found here.


For more information on the EQAF 2010 Forum, go to:
EQAF 2010 coordinated by the EUA.

ENQA workshop on QA & Learning Outcomes, Vienna, Austria 9-10 September 2010



 

ENQA, in cooperation with FHR - Fachhochschulrat, is organising a workshop on quality assurance and learning outcomes which will be held on 9-10 September 2010 in Vienna, Austria.
 
Learning outcomes are described as written statements of what a learner is expected to know, understand and/or be able to do at the end of a period of learning. At the beginning of the 90s, a EU pilot project on ECTS showed that study programmes were much easier to compare if they were described in terms of outcomes, instead of inputs. Learning outcomes started to gain importance at policy level and have been then supported by the development of national qualifications frameworks (Berlin Communiqué), the adoption of the ESG, the overarching outcomes-focused Framework for Qualifications of the European Higher Education Area (FQEHEA) (Bergen Communiqué) and the European Qualifications Frameworks for Lifelong Learning. The ESG and Qualifications Frameworks are having an increasing influence on quality assurance procedures. 


The results of an ENQA survey on quality procedures of quality assurance agencies across Europe and beyond (2008) witnessed the education's shift from a teaching to a learning focus and the methods of agencies are more and more based on learning outcomes. This survey revealed that learning outcomes only start to be addressed in external QA at programme and institutional level procedures.
QA agencies cannot ignore student centered learning and learning outcomes, which are part of the Bologna reform agenda. The importance of learning outcomes will increase for several reasons. Firstly, learning outcomes make qualifications more transparent for students. Then, the range of graduates is becoming wider and thanks to learning outcomes, employers may have a better understanding of the acquired knowledge, skills and competences in order to recruit the most suitable candidate. Learning outcomes benefit for quality assurance as they increase transparency and comparability between qualifications standards. Learning outcomes are also valuable in terms of course design.
Naturally, objections have also been expressed with regard to student-centred learning and learning outcomes. They mainly question the focus on the individual learner, the difficulties in the formulation and implementation, and the inappropriate approach to higher education and academic study.

The workshop will address the question of what stakeholders expect from quality assurance agencies in connection with learning outcome orientation. The opportunities and challenges of the learning outcome orientation in the higher education sector will be discussed from different perspectives. The workshop will try to define the role that learning outcomes should play in external quality assurance and how they can or should be considered within the scope of external quality assurance.

The workshop is addressed mainly to ENQA members, associates and affiliates.

Programme
The programme is available here (pdf).

Venue
Hotel Hilton Danube
Handelskai 269
1020 Vienna, Austria

Registration and Fee
The places will be filled on first come first served basis. The registration can be done on the registration area of the ENQA website. The deadline for registration is August 1, 2010 or until the workshop is fully booked. Organisations can register one participant each (excluding speakers). The participation fee is 150 euro.

For further information, please contact Nathalie Costes or Maria Stalter at the ENQA Secretariat.

Start of the Belgian Presidency of the European Union
The Belgian Presidency's website provides information on the formal and informal Councils, conferences and cultural events. You can find the programme & priorities of the Belgian Presidency and the list with the most important events of each sector.

The EURASHE secretariat
Ravensteingalerij 27/3
1000 Brussels
Belgium
Tel.: + 32 (0) 211 41 97
Fax: + 32 (0) 211 41 99
eurashe@eurashe.eu
www.eurashe.eu