Report 2009:13 R

How Did Things Turn Out?

During 2008, evaluation activities at Högskoleverket (Swedish national Agency for Higher Education) have been influenced by the introduction of the new quality auditing system from 2007. Some areas have run well, while others have had more difficulty taking shape. The audits of quality assurance, which the Swedish National Agency for Higher Education carried out in two rounds at a number of higher education institutions over the 1995—2002 period, will now be carried out at all higher education institutions in a third round. This audit has taken good shape after the first year, and will now run until the end of 2012 for the remaining 40 higher education institutions.
 
The aspects that are applied are those developed by the European Association for Quality Assurance in Higher Education (ENQA). Assessment of the higher education institution's quality assurance is done using a three point scale, where A represents excellent quality assurance and C is unsatisfactory quality assurance. During 2008, nine higher education institutions have been evaluated and only one, Mälardalens högskola (Mälardalen University), received the highest grade. Three institutions, Karlstads universitet ( Karlstad University ), Malmö högskola ( Malmö University) and Örebro universitet (Örebro University), received a fail grade, with the requirement that they submit an action plan within one year, presenting how the reported faults will be remedied. In 2009, quality audits will be carried out at fourteen higher education institutions.

In 2008, the Agency has carried out 298 audits of courses and programmes at first, second and third-cycle levels. This is the first time the Agency has evaluated the main fields of study (instead of main subjects) at first and second-cycle level, as regards the requirements made in the new System of Qualifications. The new system for programme evaluation has suffered from methodology problems. However, the results are acceptable and the experience gained will be put to use in the changes made ahead of the new system of programme evaluations that will be introduced in 2010. Due to these problems, the Agency chose to delay 2009's evaluations by one year. This means that the programmes that should be evaluated in 2009, according to the established six-year cycle, will instead begin the new evaluation system in 2010.
 
During 2008, follow-ups have been carried out for more than 30 programmes which had their degree-awarding rights called into question in the spring of 2007. The rights of 16 of these to award degrees were withdrawn after experts did not approve their statements regarding the measures they had taken. It is worth noting that throughout the entire first six-year cycle of programme evaluations, 2001—2007, the Agency only revoked two degree-awarding powers.

Since it was introduced in 2007, a total of twelve institutions have been reviewed for the Utmärkelsen framstående utbildningsmiljöer (Award of Centre of Excellence in Higher Education), which has extremely high requirements. The language used in the testing process is English, and reviews and testing are carried out by internationally recruited generalists and experts. Two awards were given in 2008.

Thematic studies, which have replaced the previous thematic evaluations, are a new element of the quality assurance system. The two studies that have thus far been carried out, Frihetens pris — ett gränslöst arbete (The Price of Freedom — Limitless Work, Swedish National Agency for Higher Education's report series 2008:22 R) and Förkunskaper och krav i högre utbildning (Prior Knowledge and Requirements in Higher Education, published 3 June 2009), demonstrate the need for occasional deeper analyses of the information found in the evaluations. The Agency has established, in innumerable evaluation reports, that lecturers in higher education have a stressful work situation, caused by more heterogeneous student groups with greater variations in prior knowledge. On the other hand, in a number of evaluations, students have highlighted the fact that requirements are too low and that they are able, to a considerable extent, to work alongside full time studies. The thematic studies problematise these contradictory depictions, as well as discussing possible causes and the need for measures in the future.