Recently I got into contact with Eltjo Bazen. He is Chief Product Owner Quality Assurance at HU UAS Utrecht. He calls himself a self-appointed ambassador of the European Standards and Guidelines. At the moment, he is working on his master thesis for the Schouten Nelissen University of Applied Sciences (SUAS) on quality management. The initial question for his research is: “What vision(s) of quality appear(s) from the additions to the ESG, made by QAAs in their External Quality Assurance (EQA) activities of higher education, how widely is/are this/these vision(s) spread and how well do they fit to the ESG and its underlying vision of quality?”
Subquestions are:
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- What standards are added on top of the obligatory ESG-standards by QAAs in their frameworks?
- How could the added standards be categorized?
- Are there patterns visible in added standards, such as thematic or regional?
- What do the patterns in the added standards indicate about differences in vision of quality?
- How can the standards of the ESG be categorized?
- Is there a relationship between the patterns in the added standards and its underlying vision(s) of quality on the one hand, and the patterns and the underlying vision of quality of the ESG themselves on the other hand? If so, how do these relate?
As a theoretical framework he uses the four different paradigms in the thinking of quality by Van Kemenade & Hardjono (2018). In their research this grouping of ways to understand the concept of quality is taken as the lens to look at how quality is comprehended. Eltjo’s idea is to categorise the additional standards into one or more of the paradigms. The goal is to determine if added standards are indicators of a difference in vision of quality and quality assurance in higher education between the ESG and the QAA that added these extra standards, what the other vision of quality is, and which paradigm this vision aligns with.
The ESG date from 2015 and will be revised in the near future. As an external result, the outcomes of Eltjo’s research may be used to advise the relevant stakeholders and ministers in their process towards a new revision of the ESG. If and when it turns out that certain aspects are considered crucial for a high quality of higher education by several QAAs, but those aspects are now not part of the ESG, these might be considered for being integrated in the new ESG. Moreover, this research is hoped to stimulate the conversation around the ESG revision process towards including a fundamental consideration of visions of quality.
Eltjo asked me to support his scientific endeavours for his thesis. I gladly accepted and will keep you up to date.
Van Kemenade, E.A. and Hardjono T.W. (2018) “Twenty-first century Total Quality Management: the Emergence Paradigm”, The TQM Journal, 31(2): 150-166 (135 citations, impact factor 3.25) https://doi.org/10.1108/TQM-4.04-2018-004.