There is considerable evidence of high quality in Finnish education, the most conspicuous being the PISA results referred to elsewhere, which placed Finland in the international top in outcome of compulsory schooling. The quality of teacher training is often mentioned as one reason for these results, which may indicate high quality also in university education. The polytechnics, on their side, have been judged favourably by international reviewers (OECD, 2003). Furthermore, the kind of arguments put forward in many other countries about declining standards following the strong expansion of university education have not really surfaced in Finland. This may depend on the severe restriction of intake to Finnish universities, but the priority given to knowledge in the Finnish society and the quality culture built up over the years also contributes to the present status of Finnish tertiary education.
This evaluative culture has developed by stages from the mid 1980s (Välimaa, 2004). At the start the focus was on discipline-specific evaluations of research but in the beginning of the 1990s different approaches to institutional and programme evaluation were tried out by Finnish universities. The diversified strategy encouraged by the Ministry promoted a social climate in which evaluation was accepted as a regular activity in HEI. Ever since the Finnish system of evaluation and quality assurance has remained decentralised, based on voluntary participation by the institutions and focused on quality enhancement rather than control. “Fitness for purpose”; mutual trust and partnership have been the guiding principles, i.e. quality has been measured against the HEIs’ own objectives and with improvement the dominant consideration.
A third round of evaluations began in 1996 with the establishment of FINHEEC (the Finnish Higher Education Evaluation Council). The task of the new agency was to act as an advisory board to the Ministry and to support HEIs to develop and improve the quality of education. FINHEEC
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also took on the task of evaluating the polytechnic institutions for accreditation/approval by the Ministry during the experimental period. This development meant more of central coordination and professionalisation of higher education evaluation and Finland gradually developed into a leading nation in quality assurance in Europe.16 Since 2000 FINHEEC is hosting the European association for quality assurance in higher education, ENQA.
FINHEEC is responsible for evaluating the quality of education and other activities in both universities and polytechnics and performs a broad range of activities: institutional, programme and thematic evaluations and accreditation of professional courses. It is independent from government steering and there are no direct links with funding. Some supporting measures used in addition to evaluation and quality assurance, like the selection of quality units in HEI and centres of excellence in research and adult education, do, however, have economic consequences.
A fourth round in evaluation policy is currently under way. Imposed changes come from fulfilling the agreements on comparability of degrees and on increased mobility in the European Higher Education Area (according to the standards and guidelines adopted in Berlin 2003 and Bergen 2005). The accreditation era of polytechnics is over and the activities of FINHEEC are now part of the national strategy for increased international visibility and competitiveness. Auditing the quality assurance systems of HEIs has become the focal area, and an Audit Manual to give effect to this new orientation has been produced (FINHEEC, 2005). External evaluations of all HEIs will be made in order to establish whether their quality assurance system promotes the attainment of national higher education policy objectives, as well as those set by the HEI itself. The first round of audits will be finished by 2010. Subject and programme evaluations will continue, presumably at a slower pace (depending on what will become of the new degree system). The quality of teaching and learning per se is not evaluated at a micro-level.
The primary responsibility for quality assurance lies with each HEI. The institutions are required by law to evaluate their own activities and performance on a regular basis and to establish internal quality assurance systems. HEIs are encouraged to strengthen their quality assurance procedures in order to prepare themselves for the demonstration of quality required in national and international cooperation. The review team was introduced to different approaches during the site visits, e.g. the advanced
16 In the Stocktaking report for the Conference of European Ministers in Bergen
2005 Finland reached the highest levels on the scorecard concerning quality assurance (all but the level of international participation, co-operation, and networking was ranked excellent).
8. ASSURING AND IMPROVING QUALITY – 73 quality management system of the University of Kuopio (see Omar and Liuhanen, 2005).
FINHEEC is a comparatively small and cost-effective national agency, an expert body strictly limited to quality enhancement and development of higher education evaluation.17 The impression was widely conveyed that the agency is respected and enjoys the trust of HEIs. The evaluation reports are accepted and used for improvement. It should be observed that:
− Representatives of HEI management and students, and often stakeholders as well, take part in the planning and implementation of evaluations.
− The follow-up procedures, on the other hand are not so transparent. In a system of quality auditing the main responsibility for follow-up rests with the institutions. In the future, in the case the institution does not pass the audit, a re-audit will take place within two years time with the focus on the improvement proposals made by the audit team.
− Students have an important role in the internal quality assurance process in the universities, but not to the same extent in the polytechnics. Representatives of the student unions seem confident that the audits gave them relevant information.
− The involvement of graduates in evaluation seems to be a weak point and the criterion of educational outcome in terms of employment experiences is not so frequently used in the Finnish system, at least not at the national level.
− The FINHEEC evaluations have a strong international dimension in that, from the start, international members act on external panels and most reports have been published in English (which is not the case in many other countries). Out of nearly 100 evaluation reports published since 1996 almost half were international projects.