1. LINQ Conference: European and International Conference Learning
Innovations and Quality May 16- 17, 2013
Quality assurance of higher education:
National trends of development and
accreditation in Kazakhstan
Gulnara Sarsenbayeva (Kazakhstan)
Rome, 2013

2. Higher education in Kazakhstan:
Global dimension
 Internationalisation/globalisation:
increased competition, growing global higher
education market, entering into global
educational marketspace
 Bologna process: Priorities: 3 cycle system,
Quality assurance, Recognition of qualifications
and periods of study

3. Higher education in Kazakhstan:
National dimension
 National priorities: great variety of national
policies and corresponding requirements on
HEIs
 National strategy: Kazakhstan with
ambitious economic and social goals – focus
on research and wider societal transformation
process

4. External factors impacting Higher Education
 Rapid pace of technology innovation and
deployment
 IT and a knowledge-based society are the catalysts
 Globalization
 Changing demographics and diversity
 Who will be tomorrow’s customers, inventors, and
leaders? What will be modern Profile of engineers,
teachers, lawyers, etc.
 Non-technical forces will be key drivers of
technological innovation
 International standards and agreements

5. Quality assurance: an essential tool for Kazakhstan
HEIs on the way to knowledge society
 Institutional level: Enhancing internal quality
 Building Quality: New Evaluation Methodology
 Institutional Evaluation system: national &
international
 Quality Culture
 Kazakhstani Forum for Quality Assurance:
conferences, symposiums, round tables

6. Enhancing internal quality: Mechanisms
for internal quality
 Selection of priority areas for internal quality on the basis of
institutional self-evaluation
 Linking university data collection and analysis with internal
quality processes
 Ensuring effective feedback loops on outcomes of internal
quality processes (follow-up) and communication to the
university community
 Avoiding overly bureaucratic or complicated processes
 Critical analysis & discussions of QA issues

7. Enhancing internal quality: processes
 Range of involvement:
 Broad involvement of the university community (students, academic and
administrative staff) in the development of internal quality measure
(bottom-up)
 University leadership to fully endorse and backup the implementation
(top-down)
 Cooperation
 Information updates at internal, national and international debates &
discussions
 Exchange of experiences and good practices with other HEIs, nationally
and internationally
 Using opportunities for benchmarking
 Active participation in national negotiations about the scope of quality
measures

8. Lessons learned from QA activities
• There are no “one-fits-all” solutions, but it is possible to
define common principles for internal quality
• There is no single definition of quality or excellence
-> relative concepts
• Quality is not a neutral concept (can be measured, there
are instruments to measure, criteria)
• Quality is closely related to ideology and power (who
defines quality in which way, who is accountable to whom
etc.)
• Direct correlation between autonomy and quality culture
(Autonomy linked with accountability)

9. QA: Cybernetics postulate
 Everything that functions has to develop
 Two types of management: operation
management & development management

10. Concept of QA
 Transformation of quality control system into system of
development
 New system of monitoring of quality in order to build
recommendations for further enhancement
 New system of management (autonomy, research
university, modern strategic management, etc.)
 New technologies of quality (Program committees,
Industry Advisory Boards, System of Data Collection, etc)
 New model of training: modern strategies of teaching,
methods of teaching, introduction of integrated fields, etc.)

11. Quality assurance system: main components
 Evaluation of programs (Students’ survey, employers
survey, market survey)
 Contemporary role of a teacher (enhancement of
teaching, defining innovative cost and real value of
knowledge)
 System of self control, self evaluation

12. QA: accreditation
 Evaluation of professional communities
 Logics and effectiveness of educational process
 Internal evaluation
 Accreditation is not ranking, not rating!It is an effective
tool for measuring quality!
 Outcomes fit to demands of professional requirements &
criteria

13. Recommendations
 University- Industry cooperation: University chairs at
industry, industry representative offices at universities
 Curriculum development: discussions with professionals
 Quality assurance: system-based vs. process-based
 Effective management = QA (new methods of strategic
management, management of changes & reforms)
 QA - Operation management, Development Management
 Educational standards vs. quality standards
 Building Quality assurance, support and
development systems

14. Thank you for your attention!
Questions/Answers
Gulnara M. Sarsenbayeva (PhD, Ed)
Kazakh NationalTechnical University after K.I.Satpaev
(Almaty, Republic of Kazakhstan)
guliesars@gmail.com