August 21, 2022
Bratislava, 21. 8. 2022
The first four Slovak higher education institutions have reported Slovak Accreditation Agency of their compliance with accreditation standards and the Act on Quality Assurance of Higher Education.
“As of today, St. Elizabeth University of Health and Social sciences, the University of Trnava, the Slovak University of Technology in Bratislava, and the University of Management have sent a report of their compliance with the quality standards,” said Robert Redhammer, chair of the Agency’s Executive Board. “We assume that the universities will fulfil their obligation within the statutory deadline of 1 September 2022,” he added.
Universities are obliged to comply with their internal regulations with the requirements of the National Council Act No. 269/2018 Coll. on Quality Assurance in Higher Education by 1 September 2022. This follows the two-year period from the entry into force of the accreditation standards, during which higher education institutions have to establish their internal quality assurance systems and put them into practice. Universities are obliged to regularly review the quality of the study programmes offered as well as the education itself.
SAAHE expects that the majority of HEIs will fulfil their obligation in time. “We expect that from September, universities will provide education in study programmes that meet the requirements of the standards. The agency will only review compliance with the standards when the institutions submit an application,” Redhammer says. The accreditation processes are fundamentally student-centred through the standards, which is a big change from the past, and they are also intended to link theory to practice. The agency will then review internal quality systems for compliance with the standards and the act. Proper implementation should help to improve the quality of higher education in real terms.
The Agency will review the internal systems of universities and their compliance with the standards only after the university has submitted a request for an evaluation of the internal system’s compliance with the standards and the act. By law, universities must do so by the end of the calendar year 2022. Universities, therefore, have four months to prepare for external accreditation.
The Agency will report on the compliance of higher education institutions with the quality requirements in September.
Media contact:
Lucia Bittnerová; lucia.bittnerova(at) saavs.sk
