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Title of the project:  «Quality Assurance in Russian Higher Education: integration with European approaches – integration into European space» (№ 611520-EPP-1-2019-1-RU-EPPJMO-SUPPA

Project type: Jean Monnet – Support to associations (Erasmus+)
Context, goals and objectives of the project. In the Russian Federation, in accordance with the Federal Law “On Education”, from 1992 to the present, the mandatory procedure for confirming the conformity of the quality of education is the state accreditation procedure, based on the requirements of the federal state educational standard, carried out by the federal state body – the Federal Service for Supervision in the Sphere of Education and Sciences (Rosobrnadzor, RON). In 1992, Russia was one of the first countries in Europe to introduce accreditation of educational institutions and develop its own technology for assessing the quality of education in order to maintain a single educational space in the country. In recent years, the situation in Russia has undergone significant changes related to economic and demographic reasons, the modernization of the state educational policy, the internationalization of higher education and, in particular, joining the Bologna process. These reasons have led to a transformation in the content and structure of the higher education system in Russia and have changed quality assurance procedures. In December 2012, the new law “On Education in the Russian Federation” introduced new tools for assessing the quality of education, clearly delineating the responsibilities of the state and public structures. Currently, Russian legislation allows various forms of accreditation: along with the mandatory state accreditation of educational activities, there is public accreditation of universities and professional public accreditation of educational programs.

Russian Register believes that there is a need to integrate Russian quality assurance and quality assurance agencies into the community of independent agencies operating in the European space and around the world in order to encourage Russian universities to improve the quality of services in accordance with generally accepted standards in Europe in order to ensure high competitiveness higher education, the mobility of students, teachers and staff, improve the transparency of quality control and evaluation in education. To achieve these goals, it is necessary to integrate existing approaches to quality assurance in Russian higher education with European approaches.
Thus, the main goal of this project is to create a methodological basis for independent accreditation of educational programs, harmonized with ESG standards, taking into account the best European practices, their implementation and wide distribution in the Russian Federation.

Taking into account the above-mentioned features of the national quality assessment system in education and the reasons for its changes, the Association sees the following tasks for the project:

1. Research, study, adaptation of the European experience in assessing the quality of higher education to the national system.
2. Integration of approaches to assessing the quality assurance of higher education used in the European area of higher education and in Russia.
3. Dissemination and promotion of approaches to assessing the quality assurance of higher education, applied in the European Higher Education Area, in the Russian Federation and in the world.

Brief description of the project. The project consists of 3 parts: Research, Methodology and Adaptation.

In the first part of the project (Research), the project team conducts research, analysis and adaptation of the European experience in assessing the quality of higher education to national practice, for which:

• conducts research on approaches to assessing the quality of higher education in Russia (state accreditation, GEF requirements) and Europe (independent quality control, based on ESG),
• analyzes the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and risks of both approaches, taking into account national characteristics and legislation in the field of labor and education (SWOT analysis)
• establishes requirements for conjugation of integral approaches based on SWOT analysis
• defines approaches for integrating procedures for external independent assessment of the quality of higher education, conducted by a third party, through a correlation analysis of recognized European best practices and standards and Russian approaches.
• develops an approach to an external independent assessment of the quality assurance of higher education by the Association as a third independent party in order to ensure academic mobility, competitiveness and integration into the European higher education area and its assessment community.

The results of the first part of the project work are consistently and logically developed in the second part of the project (Methodology). Its goal is to integrate the approaches to assessing the quality assurance of higher education in the European Higher Education Area and the Russian Federation and to ensure that the activities of the Association comply with the requirements of the ESG with the final approbation in the partner universities of the Russian Federation. To achieve the goal of the second part of the project, the Association solves the following tasks:
• creation of internal assessment procedures of the Association to ensure the work on international accreditation of educational programs, taking into account the ESG standards and the practice of European agencies for assessing the quality of education. The results obtained at this stage are discussed and finalized at a workshop organized by the Association together with the stakeholders of the project: universities, students and graduates, prof. community/labor market, agencies, educational oversight/regulators, founders;
• formation of an expert pool for assessment procedures for quality assurance in higher education in accordance with the requirements and practice of the European Higher Education Area as the main resource of any independent Agency. At this stage, the requirements for the competence of experts are established, the procedure for selecting, preparing, registering and maintaining the competence of experts is regulated. Then the project team ensures the necessary competence of experts and staff of the Association;
• developing a training program for experts and conducting training for experts, students and teachers of the Association as experts in international quality assurance. The project team will organize a training seminar / webinar for candidate experts. Candidates pass certification tests and create a pool of experts of the Association for International Quality Assurance;
• Establishment of an International Accreditation Council for decision making. This is the phase of the project that ensures the independence of the accreditation procedures. At this stage, the Council for the Accreditation of the Association is being created, its work is regulated for subsequent work on the accreditation of the Council;
• piloting the International Accreditation procedures developed by the Association and described above. Organization and conduct of external audits of the educational program in accordance with the developed requirements, agreed with the ESG, within the framework of joint international accreditation with a partner agency of the European Higher Education Area. Experts from the newly created pool will do the job. Piloting will be carried out at the site of the partner universities of the project;
• development and maintenance of the Agency’s website
Associations with English versions of pages.

In the third part of the project (runs in parallel with part 2 and covers the entire duration of the project in 2019-2022), the project team is engaged in the dissemination and promotion of the European Higher Education Area approaches to assessing the quality assurance of higher education in the Russian Federation.  The main activities to disseminate the results of the project:

• Forum on sustainable development of education, St. Petersburg, 10.2020
• International Conference “Quality Management Systems in Education”, Kazan, 11.2022,
• Activities for the dissemination of information on the subject of assessing the quality assurance of higher education in various subjects of the Russian Federation,
• Information project of the Association on the subject of quality assurance in higher education – electronic bulletin of media news “Education Quality News”.

Program for solving project problems. Planned results of the project