The project Examining Quality Culture in Higher Education Institutions (EQC) aimed to provide an overview of the internal quality assurance processes in place within higher education institutions across Europe and tackled the question of how they have responded to Part 1 of the European Standards and Guidelines for quality assurance (ESGs).

The report highlights five conditions that lead to an effective quality culture:

1. It is important not to rely on a single quality assurance instrument, such as the student questionnaires, particularly if they shape staffing decisions (e.g., promotions). There must be a mix of several instruments to ensure good intelligence. These instruments must be related to institutional strategies and – ultimately – to academic values. Their costs and benefits must be reviewed regularly: this includes not only financial costs and benefits but also psychological aspects (e.g., do they lead to unnecessary stress or unreasonable workloads) and whether they really contribute to embedding an effective and shared quality culture, supporting the institutional strategy and providing accountability toward students and the wider public.
2. The most effective internal QA arrangements are those that derive from effective internal decisionmaking processes and structures. Having clear accountability lines and clarifying responsibilities at all levels ensure that the quality assurance system is kept as simple as possible while closing the feedback loops and this should, if anything, reduce bureaucracy by limiting data collection, reports and committees to what is absolutely necessary. It is crucial to identify who needs to know what and, furthermore, to distinguish between what is necessary vs. what would be nice to know. In addition, students and staff feel at home, first and foremost, in their faculties and departments. This argues in favour of an optimal balance between the need for a strong institutional core and a degree of faculty responsibilities, between the need for an institution-wide QA approach and some local variations in faculties.
3. Like external quality assurance, internal quality assurance processes are also about power. Internal quality assurance can be contested if it does not successfully engage the university community. Leadership is essential to give the initial steer and the broad frameworks of quality assurance mechanisms. Leadership should facilitate internal debate – and even tolerate dissent – in order to make sure that quality assurance processes do not end up being imposed and simply bolted on. Linked to this, the type of language used by the leadership and the QA officers in describing the QAarrangements cannot be dismissed as trivial. The more academic and the less managerial it is, the more likely it will make inroads in the institution.
4. It is essential to invest in people through staff development to avoid internal quality assurance arrangements becoming punitive. It is encouraging to note the pace at which staff development schemes are growing in universities but professionally-staffed centres that support teaching and learning are still a rarity. This will require attention in the years ahead particularly because of the renewed emphasis on student-centred learning in the Bologna Process.
5. Both institutional autonomy and self-confidence are key factors in the capacity of institutions to define quality and the purposes of their internal quality assurance processes and to ensure that these are in line with their specific profiles, strategies and organisational cultures. In doing so, these institutions are sometimes confronted with their external quality assurance agencies’ processes, which might be at cross-purposes. It is essential that the internal and external processes are viewed together and that the higher education community – the institutions and the agencies – negotiate the articulation between the two sets of processes in order to ensure true accountability, avoid duplication of evaluations and QA fatigue.