Promoting Quality in Higher Education: Opportunities and Challenges for the Private Higher Education Institutions in Ethiopia

Abstract

This paper is based on evidence collected from visits to eight public sector and three private sector higher education institutions visited on behalf of the Higher Education Systems Overhaul Report of the Higher Education Strategy Overhaul Committee of Inquiry into Governance. Leadership and Management in Ethiopia’s Higher Education System Overhoul (HESO) study and a further two visits to private sector institutions on behalf of the Quality and Relevance Assurance Agency (QRAA) and the Ethiopian Higher Education Strategy Institute (EHESI) and the analysis undertaken by the HESO study. It suggests that private higher education institutions (HEIs) should focus on improving their quality systems in order to: • provide students and their families with quality information to ensure market share and a return on educational investments; • develop quality systems to assure Government that an investment in the private sector would yield appropriate returns in terms of development goals; • influence the processes developed by the QRAA for accreditation and subject assessment; and • raise the profile and esteem of the private higher education sector amongst stakeholders. The paper describes a variety of methods that might be used to assure quality and standards. These include benchmarking, performance indicators, quality audit and quality assessment. It then outlines some foci suggested by the World Bank that might usefully be employed in quality assessment or audit before considering the need to critically assess the accountability burden and the nature of evidence within whatever quality assurance systems that are developed.