A nonparametric (or distribution-free) statistical quality control chart is used to monitor the cumulative grade point averages (GPAs) of students over time. The chart is designed to detect any statistically significant positive or negative shifts in student GPAs from a desired target level. This nonparametric control chart is based on the…

Research suggests that high quality early care and education programs can have a significant impact on improving the cognitive, academic and social skills of all children, especially those most at risk for later school failure. A number of states are developing Quality Rating and Improvement Systems (QRIS) to assess and improve the quality of…

Student demand for online education requires colleges and universities to rapidly expand the number of courses and programs offered online while maintaining high quality. This paper outlines two universities respective processes to assure quality in large-scale online programs that integrate instructional design, eBook custom publishing, Quality…

Physician competencies have increasingly been a focus of medical education at all levels. Although competencies are not a new concept, when the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME) and the American Board of Medical Specialties (ABMS) jointly agreed on six competencies for certification and maintenance of certification of…

This article provides an analysis of assessment practices on one university-led teacher-training course in England, delivered across a network of further education colleges. After establishing that assessment practices are bound up in texts of different kinds, this article draws on two theoretical frameworks--institutional ethnography and…

This article reviews a possibility to assess university studies as a service. University studies have to be of high quality both in their content and in the administrative level. Therefore, quality of studies as a service is an important constituent part of study quality assurance. When assessing quality of university studies as a service, it is…

The article grounds the structure of the external evaluation of colleges at the level of the non-university higher education sector, and it reveals the problems met in this process as well as possibilities for their solution: the phenomenon of the external evaluation of colleges is discussed and its concept is presented; the external evaluation…

At the beginning of the last 20 years so-called "quality revolution" it was expected from most of the established national quality agencies that internal quality systems and the development of an internal quality culture would emerge automatically in the HEI from the external quality impact. The author argues that a better balance must be found…

The article analyses how quality management is understood in higher education research. By reviewing a number of academic contributions addressing quality management issues in "Quality in Higher Education" from 1995-2008, the article identifies central concepts associated with quality management, discusses whether there are commonalities to be…

Voluntary food certification systems have emerged as a prominent mechanism of food governance in recent years. However, critics have exposed certifications' inability to secure independence, quality, consumer trust, and costs. Recent criticism is even more pointed in that some theorists have critiqued "alternative" systems such as Fair…

Policy discussions about funding in higher education focus primarily on revenues needed to balance budgets from year to year, rather than on how funds need to be invested to meet strategic priorities. The data in "Trends" show that the incremental approach to fundraising and spending has resulted in a slow disinvestment in core…

This article undertakes a review of Australian and international literature and higher education policy in response to the changing nature of university academic boards (also known as academic senates or faculty senates). It shows that governance has become an issue for both the state and for universities and that within this context risk…

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is, first, to provide a brief account of the PhD by published work focusing especially on quality assurance issues such as eligibility of candidates, the nature of the submission itself, supervision and assessment procedures. Second, it seeks to offer a discussion of the criteria to be met by candidates in…

One of the most important trends in the early childhood field is the emergence of quality rating systems (QRS), or quality rating and improvement systems (QRIS), which are designed to assess, improve, and communicate the level of quality of early and school-age care programs. QRS came onto the scene in 1998 when Oklahoma enacted its "Reaching…

The purpose of this study was to examine the appropriateness of a nationwide quality assurance framework for e-learning from participants' perspectives. Two types of quality evaluation programs were examined in this study, including the e-Learning Service Certification program (eLSC) and the e-Learning Courseware Certification program (eLCC). Gap…