A university ranking with credibility may provide proper guidance to students and parents in university choice, lead to rational flow of educational resources, promote competition among universities and evaluation mechanism in society, and inform the government in decision making. However, there are quite some disputes and doubts from the public…

It is unlikely that Stoesz and Karger will be widely commended for the critique of social work accreditation. Social work academics do not usually handle criticism with equanimity. In some respects, their case is overstated. The problems associated with social work accreditation are not caused by the low publication productivity of social work…

Our purpose is to document convergences and divergences in the mode of institutional regulation of the education systems in five European countries (Belgium, England, France, Hungary and Portugal). On the national level, partially convergent policies create, to varying degrees and with different temporal rhythms, variants of a post-bureaucratic…

Thanks to China's reform and opening to the world over the last three decades, the conventional normal education system, which is characterized by independent orientation, is now being challenged by a comprehensive and multi-faceted modern teacher education system that has taken shape. It is high time that we attached great significance to the…

The state of higher education today is one of change and stasis. Economic vulnerability, globalization, technological innovation, and an increasingly competitive market underlie the need for change in higher education. At the same time, there are strong and stubborn forces at work supporting the status quo. Though daunting, institutions of higher…

The performance of a school system can be evaluated through the learning levels of the pupils, usually summarized by school mean scores. The variability of the mean scores among schools is rarely studied in detail, though it is a crucial issue especially in primary schools: in fact, a high variability among schools raises doubts on the capacity of…

When Dr. James Ammons took the helm of his alma mater, Florida A&M University (FAMU), he inherited a nationally recognized school facing numerous crises. Ammons, who served as provost of FAMU during its heyday in the 1990s, knew the school was mired in trouble with the state, having accumulated dozens of state auditor questions about its…

Much has been written about the education policies and practices that countries and schools are putting in place. At the other end of the spectrum, accountability systems and assessments such as the Program for International Student Assessment shed light on the results that are achieved. Much less is known, however, about how policies and…

Policymakers, administrators, and institutional researchers should recognize the critical stakeholders in the area of institutional effectiveness at the community college, their differences in perceptions about institutional effectiveness, and ways to negotiate these differences in perception. This article identifies the different stakeholders in…

For the past several years, community college presidents have retired at alarming rates. At the same time, institutional needs have shifted and new skill sets are often desired. These changes, coupled with a lack of leader succession plans, budget cuts, and an increased emphasis on accountability, created opportunities for candidates with…

This case study examined the intersection of collegiate-level student learning outcomes assessment with regional accreditation to understand how regional accreditation policies and practices leverage student learning outcomes efforts on US college campuses. To that end, the standards of each of the regional accreditation agencies were carefully…

The Commonwealth of Learning Review and Improvement Model (COL RIM) was developed by the Commonwealth of Learning in response to two key drivers: (1) Increased global emphasis on the quality of higher education; and (2) Rising concern about the high cost and uncertain benefits of conventional approaches to external quality assurance. Any…

The Higher Learning Commission (HLC), a commission of the North Central Association of Colleges and Schools (NCA), accredits Wyoming's seven community colleges. Institutional accreditation is a voluntary process that serves the critical purposes of quality assurance and institutional and program improvement. Colleges that are accredited by the HLC…

Many colleges face the challenge of recruiting examinees for institutional assessment programs. Unfortunately, students recognize these programs as low-stakes, and therefore may not have high performance motivation. This study examined the interrelationships between students' preferred incentives for taking the test, their performance motivation,…

External diagnosis is recommended when schools lack the capacity to assess their needs. This qualitative study of one Ontario district compared 33 elementary schools that conducted external diagnosis with 47 schools that used internal diagnosis. External diagnosis created pressure for change, helped schools develop a plan that included previously…