The results of the coding process clearly indicate that both ‘reduced burden’ and ‘reduced administrative burden’ are seen as important factors regarding quality assurance in higher education in the Netherlands and Flanders. ‘Reduced burden’ has been coded 81 times and ‘reduced administrative burden’ has been coded 61 times. Even though these codes seem to be fairly similar reduced administrative burden specifically refers to the administrative part, whereas reduced burden does not refer to a specific kind of burden. This unspecified burden could refer to the administrative part but also for example to the financial part.
The educational institutions in both the Netherlands and Flanders experience a lot of (administrative) burden in carrying out the accreditation process. It is notable that reducing (administrative) burden has been a key issue over the whole analyzed time period. From 2010 to 2017 the educational institutions have repeatedly complained about the burden they experience while carrying out the accreditation procedures. Also, in this period the NVAO has stressed multiple times that reducing (administrative) burden – and thus making the system more efficient – remains one of their main aims after repeated complaints from the higher education sector. In 2012, the self-evaluation report of the NVAO stated that “the ministers
put great emphasis on a necessary reduction of the bureaucratic burden, without any concessions being made to the international legitimacy of the system” (NVAO Self-evaluation report, 2012, p. 12). The aforementioned quote shows that in both the Netherlands and Flanders reducing bureaucratic burden is acknowledged as being a priority. However, it also clearly states that this should not affect the international legitimacy of the quality assurance system in higher education. This could be seen as a very sensitive matter, especially in the Netherlands: the experienced burden, the amount of criticism and the main critics have differed between the Netherlands and Flanders and over time for two reasons.
In the Netherlands, shortcomings in the quality of universities of applied sciences were unveiled in 2010 and 2011. This scandal led to an intense public and political debate, distrust in Dutch higher education institutions, and a call for more stringent regulations in the Dutch accreditation system. These additional, more stringent regulations were partly imposed from a political level via the then State Secretary. The additional regulations led to a more bureaucratic accreditation system. Subsequently, the experienced burden was high but because of the recent scandals and the distrust in the Dutch higher education sector there was little support for complaints about the increased administrative burden. Over time, the view on the added, more stringent regulations which led to increased administrative burden changed. As the Dutch higher education sector regained trust over the years, the complaints from the Dutch higher education sector increased as well. This criticism was partly acquired by Dutch politicians. In 2015, the Minister of Education, Jet Bussemaker, announced a new framework for the accreditation system focusing mainly on reducing burden. The new framework stated that the added, stringent regulations went too far and limited the ‘space for education’ (and subsequently the possibilities for educational innovation and responsiveness) and ‘ownership of education’ of lecturers, administrators and students. Furthermore, it was acknowledged that the severe administrative burden as a result of the added regulations did not promote a quality culture but instead led to a culture of distrust and fear. At the same time, student unions and some political parties voiced their concerns regarding measures to reduce administrative burden as they were convinced that the Dutch higher education sector was not ready for more freedom yet. Furthermore, they stated that the problem lies in the Dutch higher education sector itself instead of the accreditation system
since Dutch higher education institutions tends to develop a lot more documentation than needed for accreditation out of fear to lose their accreditation.
In Flanders, there has historically been a different culture in the higher education sector than in the Netherlands. The general thought among Flemish higher education institutions was that they deserved trust based on their previous accomplishments regarding quality assurance and that they thus did not need to substantiate their quality and quality assurance via lots of documents and a very bureaucratic procedure. Political developments contributed to the amount of criticism and critics on the administrative burden. In 2014, the Flemish government announced budget cuts for the Flemish higher education sector. Critics, such as Rik Torfs, stated that universities were underfinanced and that budget cuts in combination with the ever demanding administrative burden were improper. Shortly after, when the new cabinet was inaugurated, the complaints regarding the lack of trust in the Flemish higher education sector and the administrative burden were heard by politics and the Flemish institutions were given more trust and less administrative requirements.
In sum, both the Netherlands and Flanders have stressed over time that reducing (administrative) burden is a priority. However, as the contexts of the Dutch and Flemish higher education differed, this led to different levels of supervision. As shortcomings were unveiled in Dutch higher education in 2010 and 2011 there was a loud call for more stringent supervision by the public and politicians. This call led to more (and more stringent) regulations in the accreditation system implemented by State Secretary for Education, Halbe Zijlstra (Tweede Kamer, 2012) – leading inherently to more (administrative) burden. By contrast, there was not such a call for more stringent supervision in the Flanders.
According to the Atlas.ti co-occurrence explorer, the code ‘reduced administrative burden’ was most often coded along with ‘reduced burden’ (16x). This finding was to be expected, as ‘reduced administrative burden’ refers to a more specific form of ‘reduced burden’. Furthermore, ‘reduced administrative burden’ was most often coded along with ‘cost-benefit’ (code group New Public Management) and ‘trust’ (code group institutional autonomy). The co-occurrence of ‘reduced administrative burden’ and ‘cost-benefit’ can be explained in the sense that the general thought is that by reducing administrative burden the accreditation system could be more beneficial for the institutions. Or, in other words, by reducing the
administrative burden the ‘cost’ of the accreditation system would decrease, leading to a different cost-benefit balance. Especially in Flanders there were doubts about whether the accreditation system would be beneficial enough compared to its burden. Reducing administrative burden and thereby making the accreditation system more beneficial for both educational institutions and the quality assurance panels are repeatedly mentioned. The co- occurrence of ‘reduced administrative burden’ and ‘trust’ could be explained in the following way. Over the years, the concept of ‘earned trust’ became more popular in both the Dutch and Flemish accreditation system. This concept entailed that the accreditation systems reduced the administrative requirements in the accreditation process as the institutions got more autonomy because they ‘earned trust’ based on proven previous quality. An interesting remark is that both codes belong to different code groups. As mentioned before, ‘reduced administrative burden’ belongs to the code group new public management. The code ‘trust’ belongs to the code group institutional autonomy. The co-occurrence of these codes direct to combined new public management and institutional autonomy motives.
According to the Atlas.ti co-occurrence explorer, the code ‘reduced burden’ was most often coded along with ‘reduced administrative burden’ as explained before. Furthermore, ‘reduced burden’ was most often coded along with ‘trust’ (11x) and ‘cost-benefit’ (9x). The most striking co-occurrences are, as expected, with the same codes as with the code ‘reduced administrative burden’.