Editorial

Citation

Dalrymple, J. (2011), "Editorial", Quality Assurance in Education, Vol. 19 No. 1. https://doi.org/10.1108/qae.2011.12019aaa.002

Editorial

Article Type: Editorial From: Quality Assurance in Education, Volume 19, Issue 1

The effects of the global financial crisis (GFC) are now beginning to be felt in developed and developing economies throughout the world. The immediate aftermath of the impending financial meltdown saw many economies engage in fiscal measures designed to stimulate economic growth. The stated aims were to try to ameliorate the worst effects of mass unemployment and bankruptcy of companies large and small through lowering interest rates and initiating a variety of economic stimulus packages. However, now that the worst and most immediate effects of the GFC have begun to recede, the consequences for education and other sectors of the economies are beginning to surface. For example, major reviews of the higher education systems in the UK and the Republic of Ireland have been handed down or are about to be handed down. While reviews are either available or awaited, it is the budgets of most of the countries that are foreshadowing the impact on education.

In the UK, budget deficits are being addressed through significant cuts in public expenditure. Cuts in the higher education sector may result in certain discipline areas no longer being funded from public sources, while the school sector, funded through local government, is also likely to be under pressure. There are similar concerns across the countries engaged with the Bologna process, while Greece and Ireland have required support from the European Union to stabilise their fiscal systems. It is likely that similar pressures are being experienced in most jurisdictions. In Australia, for example, the expansion of higher education is being delayed at a time when there is pressure on the international student market as a result of the very strong Australian dollar and issues arising from visa processes. In the recent past, international student fees have provided a welcome addition to the budgets of educational institutions at all levels in many jurisdictions.

In these circumstances, it is even more important than ever that the quality of education is maintained and improved and that the focus on standards and accountability remains. One major element of quality in education is accessibility. Many jurisdictions have put in place legislation that makes it illegal to exclude participation in, among other things, education on the basis of colour, creed, and gender and, more recently, disability. In addition, there has been a general movement towards increasing the participation rates of the poor and disadvantaged in all levels of education. In some jurisdictions, in particular in developing economies, this is manifested in increasing participation in primary and secondary school education. In other jurisdictions, the imperative is to increase participation in further and higher education among socio-economic groups that have traditionally had low participation rates.

The GFC has contributed to a return to the public debate over the question of whether higher education participation is a public good and, consequently, deserving of support from the public purse, or a private good that should be available on the basis of payment by the participant, and therefore beneficiary of the private good. Fortunately, the debate whether education is a public good or a private good is not prosecuted with regard to the primary and secondary education sector. It is universally recognised that school education and the associated achievement of at least minimal standards of literacy and numeracy are the right of citizens of the world. Irrespective of whether education is regarded as a public good or a private good, it is essential that the mission to improve access to services and improve the delivery of these services provides an imperative for improvement to policymakers, administrators and those involved in the direct delivery of education services. This issue presents a mixture of papers addressing access, policy and direct delivery improvement.

In the first paper, Elizabeth Vaughan and Helen Woodruffe-Burton discuss the provision of higher education to students with a disability. Earlier authors had investigated the applicability of the SERVQUAL model for assessing service delivery in public and voluntary sector environments. These authors developed a derivative model, one that they termed “ARCHSECRET” and applied it in the case of higher education students with a disability. The validity, reliability and utility of the approach all indicated that the ARCHSECRET model has potential in the assessment and improvement of higher education services to students with a disability.

The second paper, by Andrew Whiteford and Vasil Jaiani outline the process of bringing about significant policy change in the school education sector in the USA. The paper illustrates the considerations and processes that are required to navigate policy change in complex political environment. The importance of the convergence of a number of factors is demonstrated in the emergence of a “window of opportunity” for significant change. The importance of public opinion and the political management of the aspects of accountability and equity is presented. This paper is particularly pertinent at a time when the consequences of the global financial crisis may be used as a “window of opportunity” for significant change in the structure of education provision in jurisdictions where there is a financial imperative for change.

The third paper, by Dennis Law and Jan Meyer, addresses a very important issue in the pursuit of quality improvement, namely the portability of instruments, in this case the Course Experience Questionnaire, from one culture and environment to another. The SERVQUAL instrument was promoted as having universal utility, while Vaughan and Woodruffe-Burton raised issues regarding applicability in the case of service provision to students with a disability participating in higher education in the UK. The course evaluation questionnaire was originally developed in the context of Australian higher education provision and, while it would be inappropriate to “reinvent the wheel” by devising a new instrument for every NEW context, it is equally inappropriate to take an instrument that has been developed in one context and apply it in another without seeking to address issues of portability into the new context and consequent validity and reliability considerations. Law and Meyer address the portability from the Australian context to the context of education in Hong Kong of the retrospective overall education experience that students have had.

In the fourth paper, Winai Wongsurawat tackles an issue in the improvement of individual units of study. The design of many assessment instruments provides for a quantitative component that gives feedback that can be analysed using one of the many statistical packages designed for quantitative data analysis. The instruments may also include a component that invites students to add qualitative comments about the course unit. In many cases, these questions may be ignored by students, while in other cases, the responses will be viewed with interest by the course team. The author has presented an approach based on linking the quantitative and qualitative elements of feedback.

The final paper presents an approach to the development and deployment of rubrics in a Master’s level business course in the context of Indian higher education. The importance of rubrics in tracking improvements in learning of individual students as well as tracking improvements in learning at the course level is presented. This systematic approach to assessing progress in learning of individual students and at the course level is the essence of quality enhancement in the education setting.

We trust that you will find the articles in this issue provide us all with the opportunity to reflect on the various responses to the global financial crisis and consider these responses in the context of the development of quality and quality improvement in education. In particular, we hope that the insights provided in this issue will motivate readers to consider adopting some of the approaches presented in the improvement of their own practice.

John Dalrymple