An online progress visit by the European Association for Quality Assurance in Higher Education (ENQA) was held on 7 June 2024 as part of the follow-up procedure.
For the third time, in 2021, ASHE successfully underwent international external review which confirmed compliance of its operation with the Standards and Guidelines for Quality Assurance in the European Higher Education Area (ESG), and in 2022, it renewed its full membership in ENQA and its status in the European Quality Assurance Register for Higher Education (EQAR).
Early in 2024, ASHE submitted to ENQA the Report on changes and improvements carried out during the follow-up period, after which the progress visit to ASHE by ENQA Agency Review Committee was organized in June 2024.
It is a meeting in which the participants discussed the improvements carried out following the recommendations resulting from ENQA's external review of the Agency, current challenges and future plans of the Agency.
The meeting held as part of the follow-up procedure does not have any formal consequences for the Agency itself, but it was an opportunity for all participants to openly discuss the challenges in quality assurance in higher education, both within the context of the Croatian higher education system and at the international level.
For this meeting, the Agency chose three topics on which additional emphasis was placed during the discussions – follow-up on activities of higher education institutions in the accreditation procedures, providing support to higher education institutions in the development of internal quality assurance systems at higher education institutions and the implementation of the first part of the ESG, objections and appeals in the accreditation procedures and challenges in the implementation of external evaluation procedures at higher education institutions abroad, as well as conducting accreditation of joint studies.
Along with the director of ASHE, Associate Professor Danijela Horvatek Tomić, Ph.D., and ASHE employees, the meeting was attended by the representatives of the Agency’s expert bodies that are involved in external quality assurance procedures in higher education – the Accreditation Council, the Complaints Committee and the Follow-up Committee.