Doing the right things right: Quality enhancement in Higher Education

Are we doing the right things and are we doing them right? These questions should be subject to constant attention within Higher Education Institutions in pursuit of high quality educations and attracting students nationally as well as internationally. And due to the international development in Higher Education (HE), external quality assurance and improved accountability is becoming increasingly important.

At the Technical University of Denmark (DTU), an internal quality enhancement system has been developed in order to evaluate and further develop the education programs. The overall objective is to ensure that the students receive education of excellent quality when they choose to study at DTU. Furthermore, the aim is to generate feedback on the implementation and apparent success of the three plus two degree structure adopted some years ago, in accordance with the objectives of the Bologna Process.

A third aim is faculty and organisational development in order to enhance a deeper understanding of how to create quality in education programs. The system implies that two programs evaluate each other on the basis of five overall criteria. The criteria are descriptive and explain to teachers, directors of programs, and students the important factors that enhance quality in HE and strengthen the possibilities for the students to learn in a good and efficient way.

So far, it seems that the evaluation process supplies the involved teachers and directors of study programs with relevant tools for making informed adjustments in their teaching and programs. Secondly, it contributes to establishing a learning community among the teachers with a growing common understanding of what is considered good quality in engineering education.

This paper describes the internal quality enhancement system and analyses its impact on the quality of the teaching and learning at DTU. It describes how the internal evaluations prepare for external accreditations strengthening the latter by avoiding the risk of universities box-ticking their way to purchased credibility.