Delivering Quality in Higher Education in the Knowledge Economy

Commonwealth Educational Media Centre for Asia

Delivering Quality in Higher Education in the Knowledge Economy:

Structure and Parameters

Sanjaya MishraDirector

Commonwealth Educational Media Centre for Asia, New Delhi

My Organization

Commonwealth of Learning -- established in 1987

Helps developing nations improve access to quality education and training

CEMCA serves as a regional unit of COL for the Commonwealth Asia

My Experiences

As a teacher and trainer in Indian Higher Education

As a reflective thinker of the current trends and possibilities

What is Quality?

Quality is many things to many people

It is contextual It does not happen by

chance, it needs design

Needs common understanding to achieve and demonstrate

Understanding of Higher Education

Higher education as the production of qualified human resources

Higher education as training for a research career

Higher education as the efficient management of teaching provision

Higher education as a matter of extending life chances

Delors Commission on Higher Education

To prepare students for research and teaching;

To provide highly specialized training courses adapted to the needs of economic and social life;

To be open to all, so as to cater to the many aspects of lifelong education in the widest sense; and

To promote international cooperation through internationalization of research, technology, networking, and free movement of persons and scientific ideas

Quality in Higher Education

Dilemma of educational administrators to increase access, improve quality and reduce cost

Technology shows the possibilities, eg. MOOC

Does Harvard Make You Smatter?

Many successful people have studied there

What is that made these people successful?

How of their success is due to Harvard education?

Does the rigour in selection has something to do with the quality of Harvard?

Rank of Indian Higher Education Institutions

Ranking systems First Indian institution in the rank in 2013

THE Ranking of Universities Beyond 226

Ranking Web of Universities At 294

Academic Ranking of World Universities

Beyond 300

Criteria for Rankings

Ranking Systems Criteria

THE University Ranking

Teaching and learning environment (30%); Volume of research, income and reputation (30%); Citations and research influence (30%); Industry income and innovation (2.5%); International outlook: staff, students and research (7.5%)

QS World University Ranking

Academic reputation survey (40%); employer reparation survey (10%); faculty student ratio (20%); Citations per faculty (20%); Proportion of international students (5%), proportion of international faculty (5%)

Ranking of Web of Universities (Webometrics)

Impact (50%), Visibility (50% covers Presence, Openness, and Excellence)

Ine-Quality?

Quality paradigm as applied in education draws from the business and industry

Education represents a system of inequality in terms of resources, funds, and infrastructure

Comparing institutions that are not equals is unfair practice

Quality assurance as “Social Proof”

Learning Quality from Industry

Continuous Improvement (Kaizen)

Deming’s P-D-S-A Cycle

Systems thinking (Input-Transformation processes-Output) Diagram by Karn G. Bulsuk (http://

www.bulsuk.com)

Improving Quality in Higher Education

Technology as enabler Openness in the systems and practices,

Appropriate policies to promote quality and integration of technology (use of Open Educational Resources, and Open Access to scientific information)

Capacity building of teachers and students

Technology as Enabler of Quality

In Teaching Research Administration

Creating Enabling Environment for Research

Access to e-Journals

Open Access repository of research outputs

Monitoring and evaluation of research processes

Increasing Web Presence through OER

Create and use OER

Share educational materials used by faculty to demonstrate quality

Provide window to the strengths of the institution

Capacity Building of Faculty and Learners

Learning to learn ICT Skills Research Skills Teaching Skills Many other emerging areas

Value Framework for Higher EducationValues Parameters

Contribution to national development

• Increasing access with equity• Developmental thrust in research areas and

academic programmes• Community engagements

Fostering global competencies amongst students

Development of generic, application and life skills

Inculcating value system in students

Value integration in courses, administrative practices, and co-curricular and extra-curricular activities

Promoting the use of Technology

Enrichment of learning through use of technologySystems management using technology

Quest for excellence

• Continuous improvement• Benchmark of excellence• Application of best practices

Based on: Prasad (2005)

Thank You