Useful links
QAA
QAA : The Quality Assurance Agency for
Higher Education
The Agency's mission is to promote public confidence that quality of provision
and standards of awards in higher education are being safeguarded and enhanced.
Established in 1997 to provide an integrated quality assurance service for
UK higher education institutions, the Agency is an independent body funded
by subscriptions from universities and colleges of higher education, and
through contracts with the main funding bodies.
Institutional audit: England and Northern Ireland - Outcomes
To give institutions and other stakeholders more timely information, QAA has decided to produce a series of short working papers, describing features of good practice and summarising recommendations from the audit reports, to be published under the generic title Outcomes from institutional audit.
These papers are intended to provide readers with pointers to where features of good practice relating to particular topics can be located in the published audit reports. Each paper therefore identifies the features of good practice in individual reports associated with the particular topic.
Reviews and Reports
An A-Z listings contain reports on reviews of universities and colleges of higher education and higher education courses, including those offered in further education colleges
Professional bodies
Association of MBAs
Accreditation/Why Accredit MBA Programmes?
The Association provides a network for MBAs, business schools and employers, offering
an important forum for the exchange of knowledge, ideas and best practice. They also offer an
accredation service for MBA programmes.
British Association of Counselling and
Psychotherapy
89 courses being run at universities, colleges of further and higher education and independent
institutions have been accredited through the BACP Scheme for the Accreditation of Training Courses
since it was established in 1988.
British Computer Society
Exemption & Accreditation for Higher Education Institutions.
One of the Society's responsibilities under the Royal Charter is to develop and maintain
standards in educational qualifications that provide an appropriate foundation for those who wish
to follow a career in computing or information systems. As part of this responsibility the BCS
undertakes a programme of visits to Universities and other Higher Education Institutions to
review computing degree courses and HNDs.
British Psychological Society
The British Psychological Society is the representative body for psychology and psychologists in the U.K., with national responsibility for the development, promotion and application of psychology for the public good.
General Social Care Council
The General Social Care Council carries out checks on social work education to ensure
that it is good quality and consistent with our requirements. The main elements of the quality-assurance
criteria and process are set out in the Assuring Quality set of publications. There is one, or
sometimes two, for each award. You can download these publications from this site.
Higher Education Academy
The Institute for Learning and Teaching in Higher Education (ILTHE) and the Learning and Teaching
Support Network (LTSN) transferred into the Higher Education Academy on 30 April 2004. The Academy will be
fully operational in Summer 2004 and will be officially launched in Autumn 2004. In the interim, please continue
to use the existing websites for news, events, publications and resources.
Royal Society of Chemistry
The Recognition and Accreditation of Degree Courses.
A PDF file is available, intended primarily for the information of departments and course
designers, but may be of wider interest to members of the RSC and those
who employ them. It sets out the academic requirements which courses have
to meet if they are to be recognised by the RSC for the admission of graduates
to the category of Associate Member (AMRSC) and for progression to the category
of Member (MRSC), or accredited as satisfying the academic requirements
for the award of the Chartered Chemist (CChem) designation.
Other organisations
Australian Universities Quality Agency
The Australian Universities Quality Agency (AUQA) is an independent, not-for-profit national agency that will promote, audit, and report on quality assurance in Australian higher education.
AUQA was formally established by the Ministerial Council on Education, Training and Youth Affairs (MCEETYA) in March 2000. It operates independently of governments and the higher education sector under the direction of a Board of Directors. AUQA is owned by and receives core, operational funding from the Commonwealth, State and Territory Ministers for higher education who are members of MCEETYA.
Australian Universities Quality Agency Good Practice Database
Benchmarking in higher education is now a little bit easier thanks to the AUQA Good Practice Database. If you are involved in improving practices within your institution or agency, the AUQA Good Practice Database is a resource for you. As at the end of October 2005, GPs in this database have been accessed over 20,000 times.
British Council
The English in Britain Accreditation Scheme, run by the British Council and English UK,
is the quality assurance scheme for the UK ELT sector.
CoLRiC : Council for Learning Resources
in Colleges
An independent organisation dedicated to enhancing and maintaining the quality
of learning resources services in colleges throughout the United Kingdom
and Ireland.
National Youth Agency
The National Youth Agency supports those involved in young people's personal and social development.
OFSTED : Office for Standards in Education
OFSTED's remit is to improve standards of achievement and quality of education
through regular independent inspection, public reporting and informed independent
advice. OFSTED's principal task is the management of the system of school
inspection defined originally by the Education (Schools) Act 1992. This
provides for the regular inspection of all 24,000 schools in England which
are wholly or mainly state-funded.
Standing Conference for Heads of Media Services
The Standing Conference for Heads of Media Services (SCHoMS) is the professional body for heads of services working within U.K. Higher Education, with the purpose of providing a forum for discussion of strategic issues and the exchange of good practice.
UCISA : Universities and Colleges Information
Systems Association
UCISA represents the whole of higher education in the provision and development
of academic, management and administrative information systems, providing
a network of contacts and a powerful lobbying voice.
Reports and other publications
Higher Education in the
Learning Society : Report of the National Committee of Inquiry into Higher
Education
Chapter 10 of the Dearing Report deals with Quality and Standards.
Higher Education for
the 21st Century : Response to the Dearing Report
Chapter 4 of the Government's response to the Dearing Report deals with
Quality and Standards.
Library &
Learning Resources Provision for Franchised and other Collaborative Courses
Published by the Library Association in 1999, these guidelines deal with
library & learning resources (LLR) provision for students following
franchised and other forms of collaborative courses.
QAA Outcomes from institutional audit: institutions' support for e-learning