Implementation of Standards and Guidelines for Quality Assurance in Higher Education of Central and East-European Countries

KOHOUTEK, J., ed. (2009). A collection of five solid analyses made by experts on mechanisms of quality assurance in Latvia, Hungary, Poland, the Slovak Republic and the Czech Republic.
“Quality assurance” must be part of a long term policy.
There is no doubt that it is a timely publication. Its topic – quality assurance – is one of the key issues in contemporary policy debates at the international, European, national and institutional level. This multi-level concern is reflected in the structure of this volume different chapters analysing various conceptual considerations, historical developments, institutions responsible for quality assurance as well as organizational arrangements, academic and bureaucratic concerns and practical arrangements at Central and Eastern Europe level (see the first three chapters as well as the concluding one), followed by “national case studies” including Latvia, Hungary, Poland, Slovak Republic and Czech Republic; and finally supplemented by two chapters presenting the “institutional perspective”, i.e. that of the University of Western Bohemia in the Czech Republic... And it should always be kept in mind that the predominant responsibility for quality assurance will remain with those directly involved in higher education – teachers, researchers, students and administration staff. This publication, which UNESCO-CEPES has gladly included in its publication programme, is also demonstrating an enormous transformation on the road to normalcy and development of higher education which occurred over recent years in Central and Eastern Europe. Implementation of Standards and Guidelines for Quality Assurance in Higher Education of Central and East-European Countries.