EQAR Founding Assembly

Brussels, 4 March 2008

Dear Presidents of the E4 Associations,
Dear Vice–President of the Bologna Follow–Up Group,
Distinguished Guests,
Ladies and Gentlemen,

congratulations for the establishment of a new association that will govern the European Register. Today’s signature is a really important step forward for Europe’s higher education, the full meaning of which will only be appreciated in time.

I am proud of this achievement on behalf of the Commission, because the Register is the fruit of successful cooperation between the national governments and the European Union.

As we all know, the Register is endorsed by the Bologna Ministers and, at the same time, it implements the EU recommendation of February 2006.

As always in these cases, the newborn Register is surrounded by great expectations. We hope the Register will promote student mobility, increase trust between universities, and make the life of ‘accreditation mills’ harder—which is a worthy cause if there ever was one.

We have the ambition to build a Europe of peoples and the Europe of knowledge, and the two are linked. I am happy that you are working together also with non-European countries, because this is a sign of the openness of the Union.

1 Development of quality assurance

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Today I want to share with you some of my own expectations regarding quality assurance.

Improving the quality of service is a permanent concern in every field and profession, including higher education. It is of paramount importance that we keep higher–education professionals in mind in all our actions, together with their counterparts—university students.

For this reason, national and European resources are devoted to improving the effectiveness of what is called internal quality assurance or ‘quality culture’.

The Commission is supporting a series of activities of Erasmus Thematic Networks and University Associations—notably the EUA. These actions intend to help universities go through peer reviews and collegial benchmarking exercises.

And then there is external quality assurance, which is a relatively new thing. Ten years ago, few countries in Europe had experience with systematic external review of university teaching.

Pilot projects funded by the Erasmus programme persuaded the countries of the EU that these reviews were useful.

The Council recommendation on European Cooperation in Quality Assurance in Higher Education was adopted in September 1998; one year before the Bologna Declaration, which itself mentioned quality assurance.

As a result of the recommendation, ENQA was founded in the year 2000 and in its early days it had more governmental then agency members.

Nowadays, quality assurance agencies are active in almost all 46 Bologna signatory states. Most countries have one publicly funded national agency, but some countries have several. They may focus on institutional or programme evaluation, at national or regional levels.

A few agencies operate across borders and some private ones are active on a pan–European scale.

This story means that the wind of reforms that is sweeping Europe’s higher education is beginning to bear fruits.

We have to be in “Première League” in education, like in football. This is a process which advances thanks to all programmes and projects we carry out in Europe.

1.1 Mountains of data

But every silver lining has a cloud.

The increase in quality–assurance activities by universities and agencies will lead to an exponential growth in data on university performance.

This rising mountain of data needs to be processed, managed and made accessible.

Quality reviews produced by the agencies are available on the web—hundreds today and thousands tomorrow.

Let us think of the people these data are meant for.

Young secondary school leavers in search for a good bachelor programme may not be interested to read these reviews. Slightly older bachelor graduates looking for the right master’s programme may be. And so may parents and prospective employers.

This is a classic information–society problem. I would like to mention a few initiatives which are designed to come to terms with this information overload.

1.2 Qrossroads

Some ENQA members gathered in the ECA (European Consortium for Accreditation) have taken the initiative to design a template for a review summary called “Accreditation Statement”.

These statements and the underlying reports will be made accessible through a new web site called Qrossroads—with a Q1.

Sites like this will help people manage the information and I can see scope for close links between this initiative and the Register.

1.3 Classification and Ranking

Among the interested readers of the reviews produced by the agencies are the journalists and rankers of this planet.

I am aware that ranking universities can never be an exact science and each list that is published will always meet its detractors; however, a good ranking exercise is better than no ranking at all.

Besides, given the vast popularity of rankings, it seems that many people are willing to tolerate their shortcomings.

As a consequence, I believe that the right thing to do is not to reject the idea of university rankings, but to improve them and adapt them to our reality in Europe.

This is why we are supporting initiatives to arrive at more sophisticated multi–dimensional rankings which do justice to the variety of objectives of Europe’s universities.

I am referring to two pilot projects: one is a project co–ordinated by Germany’s CHE (Centre for Higher Education Development); the other is a project on classification led by CHEPS (Centre for HE Policy Studies) from the Netherlands.

One final word on this topic: Personally I’ve always had a terminological problem with the word ‘ranking’.

In my understanding, ‘ranking’ is what individuals do when they compare centres of learning according to their own priorities—in education, research, innovation, internationalisation, student services, etc.

Perhaps, we should begin to use the term ‘mapping’ for the kind of public exercise that compares institutions using non–subjective methods.

http://v1.qrossroads.eu

2 A PISA for Higher Education?

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Let me now review other initiatives that are related to the need of comparing European universities.

You may have heard that the OECD Ministers have given a cautious green light to a feasibility study that would look into the measurement of university performance.

Performance would be measured in terms of learning outcomes: what students know and what they can do with their knowledge.

This is never going to be an easy task, but it is an intriguing one.

The European Qualifications Frameworks (both Bologna’s and our EQF) as well as the Tuning project could feed into this exercise.

2.1 Indicators and benchmarks – new register of institutions?

In addition, the Commission is organising its own mapping exercise as part of the Lisbon Strategy for Growth and Jobs.

Together with the Member States, we are measuring the performance of our education and training systems on criteria such as early school leavers, participation in lifelong learning, and number of graduates in maths, science and technology.

Every two years we take stock of the work done.

EUROSTAT cooperates on these topics with the National Statistical Offices and with the OECD.

EUROSTAT is considering setting up a register of higher education institutions which would collect data on Europe’s universities and serve the needs of institutions, researchers and policy makers.

This new register would be based on existing national data collections.

2.2 European Quality Assurance Register in Higher Education (EQAR)

Last but not least, there is the Register you are establishing today.

In my view, your Register too responds to the growth of data on university performance.

The Register is a vital link in the chain of information required to make Europe’s higher education more transparent and more attractive.

It will allow people to identify the agencies that do a serious job.

Agencies will be checked against European standards and guidelines by external reviewers and endorsed by a Register Committee which has the confidence of higher education institutions, students, employers, teacher unions and public authorities.

I have no doubt the Committee will be a paragon of accuracy and fairness.

Only an accurate and fair admission practice will establish the reputation we all want the Register to have.

The Register is independent and will organise its own funding—the Commission is happy to provide some start–up money.

3 Concluding remarks: creativity and innovation

Ladies and Gentlemen,

These are important times for Europe’s higher education.

There is a great deal of peer learning taking place through the ENQA association.

These peer learning activities between agencies will not disappear with the creation of the Register.

On the contrary, the prospect of the Register and the high professional standards it sets will help agencies improve their performance.

This is the service the ENQA association provides to its existing and future members.

ENQA members also benefit from their links with the E4 Group together with universities and students.

Each party has its own constituency and brief, but, I believe, the checks–and–balances you have built in your exchanges in the European Quality Forum will be beneficial to all.

All these measurement and information tools are useful, but they are not an end in themselves.

We must never lose sight of the ultimate goal, which is to create the best possible conditions for our institutions, teachers and students to use their creative potential to the full.

The tools we develop are meant to serve this objective and we must not hesitate to adapt or abandon them when they no longer fulfil their purpose.

This is consistent with our overall policies on education; for instance, our plans to declare 2009 the European Year for Creativity and Innovation.

I hope that these two keywords—creativity and innovation—will guide us all, not only in 2009 but in the years to come.

To conclude, we are discussing what will come after 2010 in Bologna. Quality is what matters most.

The adaptation of names and titles is necessary: we are already attracting the interest of third countries like Israel, we are the first partner of China in Higher Education.

We have to continue our efforts to create a culture of quality.

Thank you very much for what you are doing.