QUALS project description

CONCORTIUM COORDINATED BY VYTAUTAS MAGNUS UNIVERSITY TOGEATHER WITH ESTONIAN PARTNERS AND THREE ALGERIAN UNIVERSITIES IS STARTING IMPLEMENTATION OF ERASMUS + CAPACITY BUILDING PROJECT FOR DEVELOPING QUALITY ASSURANCE SYSTEM IN HIGHER EDUCATION INSTITUTIONS

The European Union grant of EUR 834.590 is awarded to the ERASMUS + Higher Education – International Capacity Building project “Internal quality assurance system for agriculture and biosystem engineering related HEI of Algeria” submitted by the consortium of six universities including Aleksandras Stulginskis university as project coordinator and Vytautas Magnus University from Lithuania (both universities after the merger make one university as from the 1^st of January 2019 and actually Vytautas Magnus University will coordinate the project) , Estonian Life Science University and three Algerian universities, namely the National Higher Education School of Agronomy (Ecole Nationale Supérieure d’Agronomie d’Alger (ENSA)), the National Higher Education School of Hydraulic (Ecole Nationale Supérieure d’Hydraulique, Blida (ENSH)) and the National Higher Education School of Biotechnology (and Ecole Nationale Supérieure de Biotechnologie Taoufik Khaznadar (ENSB)). The project shall run for 36 months as of 15-11-2018 and shall end on 14-11-2021.

The project reflects the priority of Algerian Government to implement the quality assurance system in higher education. This system was not in place till now. The HEI’s are having as a target to set up their institutional quality assurance systems and to put in place all necessary measures.

The main objective of this project is to enhance the management, governance and innovation capacities, as well as the internationalization of HEIs. Project is national joint project. Three Algerian HEI’s in the field of agriculture and biosystem engineering, as beneficiary partners, in collaboration with partners from Lithuania and Estonia will work on:

offering new institutional capacity in internal quality assurance system (IQAS) within recipient HEI. This system will be developed by local Algerian experts previously trained in European partner institutions;
transfer of European experience for local staff during training sessions in European universities and following update of skills in real case situations in implementing and testing the IQAS at home institutions;
Algerian partner institutions will get the guidance and piloting in preparing self-evaluation reports and will go through external pilot evaluation by an European evaluation institution with the following sharing of experiences and lessons among partners and other stakeholders;
exploitation of project results will include transferring of project recommendations to national policy makers in higher education contributing to the national policy and methodology of quality assurance in HEI in Algeria.

Specific objectives of the project:

To develop internal quality assurance system (IQAS) within recipient HEI based on European and international standards;
To build adequate capacity of recipient HEI to implementing IQAS;
To prepare recipient HEI for external evaluation by the Algerian Ministry of Education;
To contribute to the national policy of quality assurance in higher education.

Project activities are structured in 5 Work Packages. Their cover activities, with methodologies and main outcomes as follows:

WP1. Preparation.

WP1.Preparation. This WP will cover the tasks and activities which have to identify the state of art of the Algerian HEI IQAS and specifically identify the situation in participating Algerian HEI. The analysis will be done for all three Algerian HEI using joint template elaborated by project experts. The plan for the preparation of IQAS will be drafted and adequate equipment resources related to project would be delivered. Main outcome -Problematic in target country regarding quality assurance identified.

WP2. Development.

WP3. Quality plan.

WP3. Quality plan. Pilot evaluation of ENSA study and research quality assurance system and preparation for external evaluation of Ministry Education of Algeria. That includes the institutional self-assessment and external services of pilot external evaluation of study and research of selected pilot HEI by European University Association. Main outcome -recipient HEI prepared for evaluation by the Ministry of Education.

WP4. Dissemination & Exploitation.

WP4. Dissemination & Exploitation. The overall objective of this WP is to promote, disseminate and exploit project and its results widely and effectively to relevant stakeholder groups. To effectively disseminate results, an appropriate process at the beginning of the project will be designed. This will cover why, what, how, when, to whom and where disseminating results will take place, both during and after the project period. Exploitation is transferring successful results to appropriate decision-makers at local and national systems, and convincing individual end-users to adopt and/or apply the results. Results should be sustained after the project has finished. Main outcome-Project outcomes available to policy makers.

WP5. Management.

WP5. Management.The objectives of this work package are to ensure that the project objectives are reached and milestones are achieved within the given project life time, to coordinate beneficiaries activities and monitor the work plan with regard to time, results, risks and costs. to ensure the quality control and manage a communication flow between beneficiaries and with the European Commission by setting up communication infrastructure and defining a clear and efficient communication flow between its bodies and relations between them. Main outcome-Project results, outcomes and impact achieved.