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Quality Assurance of Education and Research in Nordic Universities

– Same topic, different methods?

During the last couple of years, the Nordic Council of Ministers has been profiling the Nordic Region as a dynamic, international region in higher education as a part of its Globalization Project. Stakeholders from higher education institutions have appreciated this effort and made efforts to stand out as good examples for the rest of Europe, both in terms of education and research & development. The importance of quality assurance systems has been recognised as a major factor in the insurance of the competitiveness of the Nordic Higher Education institutions.

All the Nordic countries have made efforts to implement effective quality assurance systems for higher education and at the same time to ensure that that research within the higher education institutions is of highest international standards. This means that the Nordic countries are making efforts to ensure that these two foundations of the higher education society live up to international standards and ensure the competitiveness of the Nordic countries. However, these two quality systems do seldom interact with each other so while it is hardly questioned that education and research in higher education always interact and can hardly be separated, two different systems are implemented to check on the quality of each half. How do the quality assurance agencies in the Nordic countries evaluate the impact of research on education and the interaction between research and education in Nordic higher education institutions? The same goes for the evaluations of research in higher education institutions, done by research councils in the Nordic countries.

The recent conference, Quality and Development in Nordic Higher Education, held in Reykjavik in April (see http://formennska2009.forsaetisraduneyti.is/Vidburdir/Radstefnur/Gaedi_i_haskolastarfi/)  was a great success in many ways. The recordings and documents of the conference are already used in education in both Germany and Denmark, which shows that quality assurance of higher education in the Nordic countries is held in great esteem by Europe as does the participation of non-Nordic guests at the conference. However, the conference did not address the problem of the combined quality assurance of research and education in higher education institutions.

Recent development in higher education in Europe has shown a tendency towards increased a combined quality assurance of research and education. A newly introduced system of quality assurance in Luxemburg includes a system of combined quality assurance of research and education.

If the Nordic countries are to live up to its reputation as foregoers in the field of higher education in Europe, it would be feasible to organise a meeting of the major stakeholders in higher education and the quality assurance of research and education to discuss this matter.


Date:  10 - 12 February, 2010

Venue:  Hotel Föroyar, Torshavn, The Faroe Islands

Hosts:  Ministry of Education, Science and Culture, Iceland in cooperation with the Ministry of 
           Science, Denmark

Organizers:  Dr. Einar Hreinsson, Ministry of Education, Science and Culture, Iceland
                    Dr. Eiríkur Smári Sigurðarson, Ministry of Education, Science and Culture, Iceland