Quality assurance in higher education as an enabler of student mobility : lessons for the ASEAN region from developments in Australia and Malaysia
Creators: name: Phillips, RJ
Publisher: name: University Of Tasmania
Year: 2023

description: The study investigates the role of quality assurance in higher education in supporting cross-border student mobility. In 2019, prior to the COVID-19 pandemic outbreak, UNESCO estimated there were 5 million students studying abroad, 2.5 million away from home. Such large numbers create imperatives for transparent and robust regulatory frameworks to support qualifications recognition. In response, governments are increasingly negotiating global, regional, and bilateral treaties that support cross-border student mobility. The policy instrument of quality assurance is being extensively employed to underpin such policy frameworks with the aim of providing domestic and international students the required confidence in a nation’s higher education system. Given its widespread use, it is important to know more about how these quality assurance systems are structured and operate.<br>The increased use of quality assurance as a policy instrument in higher education is the focus of this thesis. To better understand the structure and operation of quality assurance arrangements in higher education, four key questions are addressed: (a) What is ‘quality’ in higher education and how can it be assured? (b) What role should governments play in designing and implementing quality assurance schemes in higher education? (c) How has the role of government changed in response to higher education globalisation, liberalisation and internationalisation? and, (d) How are universities with diverse missions and scope responding to the quality assurance challenge?<br>A qualitative, comparative case study approach to the research was undertaken exploring quality assurance emergence in Australia and Malaysia as the focus. The study investigates how quality assurance developed within each country, and the bilateral and regional ASEAN collaborations which are occurring. By making comparisons on how they assure higher education quality, the effectiveness of this policy instrument is evaluated, and emerging challenges identified. Data were collected and analysed from the extant literature and interviews and a semi-structured questionnaire with key stakeholders. Purposely selected practitioners and experts in the field of internationalisation and/or quality assurance in higher education from the case study countries were invited to participate. Through detailed investigation and triangulation of the data, a modified grounded theory approach was adopted to address the research questions.<br>The data showed that state intervention in higher education increased in the 1980s as neoliberal policies were introduced to expand the sector to meet growing demand, finance student places, and internationalise in the context of globalisation. Quality assurance became the policy instrument of choice, applied by governments to manage risks, and promote institutional and national reputations domestically and abroad. The sector’s expansion and diversification, including the creation of a private sector, explains why a more state-centric approach was adopted, and why centralised quality agencies were established to manage quality assurance. Although governments have chosen not to define what constitutes higher education quality per se, its meaning in practice emerges through the application of multidimensional threshold standards that are embedded in national quality assurance frameworks. In cross-border mobility, harmonisation and recognition of qualifications increasingly occurs through a mapping of the frameworks. It is suggested that strengthening international cooperation in this will be vital to ensure ease of portability of qualifications from one country to another. The findings of this thesis will benefit higher education practitioners and government officials interested in promoting seamless student mobility.