Discusses the purposes of institutional accreditation, forms of affiliation with the North Central Association's Commission on Institutions of Higher Education, general institutional requirements, criteria for accreditation, candidate for accreditation status, accreditation and institutional improvement, services of the Commission, and varieties…

The current standards of the two business education accrediting agencies reflect the influence of outcomes assessment. Because of pressures on institutions to compare themselves to one another or external standards, business schools must become more knowledgeable about externally developed outcomes assessment tools. (SK)

Notes that the faculty is intrigued by the opportunity to design an alternative form of external review; the reaccrediting system of the Accrediting Council on Education in Journalism and Mass Communications is inflexible and adversarial; and the reaccrediting system continues to be based on the assumption that journalism and mass communication is…

Discusses the purposes of institutional accreditation, forms of affiliation with the North Central Association's Commission on Institutions of Higher Education, general institutional requirements, criteria for accreditation, candidate for accreditation status, accreditation and institutional improvement, services of the commission, and varieties…

Describes a new form of academic quality assurance, the academic audit. Reviews use of academic audits abroad and experimental use of such audits in the United States. Identifies issues in academic audits, including focus of audits, auditor selection and training, institutional preparation for an audit, interaction between institutional policies…

Discusses issues concerned with diversity and selecting peer institutions against which institutions of higher education attempt to "benchmark" themselves. Suggests diversity and peer selection can be closely linked conceptually within single scales of similarity and dis- similarity. A case study illustrates connections between diversity and peer…

A critical first step before engaging in any assessment is to consider the politics involved. This article offers advice on conducting assessments that will have credibility and impact. Issues considered include: determining the needs and interests of the groups; establishing the kinds of information and what people are ready to learn; and…

Examines the effect of assessment and accountability requirements on the English department at Eastern Kentucky University. Aims not to offer solutions but to help to define the problems faced by a particular department at a particular university in a particular context, with the assumption that other departments are facing similar problems. (TB)

Describes the Excellence in Higher Education (EHE) framework, which adapts the "Education Baldridge" to meet the specific demands of colleges and universities. Highlights the experiences of Michigan's Marygrove College in using the EHE framework to facilitate an assessment of its institutional quality and identify areas for improvement. Concludes…

This paper looks back on 10 years of accreditation in Hungary, in which the Hungarian Accreditation Committee completed the accreditation of all the country's higher education institutions and their programmes. Drawing from the lessons learned, and also based on the recommendations of the external panel that reviewed its work, the Hungarian…

Quality assurance is well known internationally but the notion is relatively new in Norway. To understand some of the issues and dilemmas that emerge in the Norwegian reception of quality assurance in higher education, this article traces how quality assurance is gaining its form and how international trends are understood, transposed and adopted…

Organizational learning, along with a framework for diversity, is an effective approach for campuses seeking sustained institutional change with regard to diversity. (Contains 2 figures.)

Quality assurance is well known internationally but the notion is relatively new in Norway. To understand some of the issues and dilemmas that emerge in the Norwegian reception of quality assurance in higher education, this article traces how quality assurance is gaining its form and how international trends are understood, transposed and adopted…

Organizational culture influences whether or not community colleges maintain local support as well as overall institutional effectiveness. This paper discusses culture and the context of culture at River Parishes Community College (RPCC) a new institution within the Louisiana Community and Technical College System, currently in its fifth academic…

This is an analysis of school tutors' assessments of aspects of "Standard one, professional values and practice" (DfES/TTA 2002) for secondary trainee teachers, together with interview data from a sample of trainee teachers and their school tutors/assessors. The paper examines teachers' interpretations of four sub-categories within this…