NIAD-QE and the Higher Education Evaluation and Accreditation Council of Taiwan (HEEACT) held their second staff exchange program, following an initial exchange which took place at HEEACT in March 2017. The exchange programs are conducted as a form of cooperation based on a memorandum of understanding (MOU) between the two organizations. This exchange took place at NIAD-QE over a five-day period from Monday, October 2 to Friday, October 6, 2017. Six members of HEEACT, including President Jong-Tsun Huang, visited NIAD-QE and participated in the program.

The purpose of this program is for the two organizations to exchange information and knowledge on quality assurance and to form closer cooperative ties. During the program, the organizations explained to each other the work that they do and, at the request of HEEACT, an opportunity was arranged for them to participate as observers in a site visit for Institutional Certified Evaluation and Accreditation (CEA) of a university.

On the fourth day of the program, NIAD-QE and HEEACT held a joint seminar on the theme of “Principles and Practices of Quality Assurance.” The HEEACT side gave presentations covering a broad range of topics including the training of evaluators, the use in university evaluation of a database on higher education maintained by the Ministry of Education, efforts for mutual recognition of higher education qualifications carried out with a quality assurance organization in Malaysia, and the outlook for Taiwan’s higher education system following adoption of voluntary program evaluations. NIAD-QE gave presentations on topics such as the third cycle of Institutional CEA, which will begin in the academic year 2019, and also introduced the “Guidelines on Internal Quality Assurance of Education,” which NIAD-QE published in March 2017.

During a feedback session on the fifth day, which was the last day of the program, NIAD-QE and HEEACT reviewed with each other the similarities and differences of the quality assurance that each conducts and held a discussion on ways to cooperate in the future. Both organizations are facing big developments: in Japan, the coming third cycle of Institutional CEA of universities; and in Taiwan, the switch to voluntary program evaluations in 2017, which where formerly mandatory evaluations under the University Act. Given this, the exchange was very significant in that it allowed the two organizations to deepen their mutual understanding of the new area that each is responsible for as a quality assurance organization.

Commemorative photo with members of HEEACT

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