Analytic Quality Glossary

A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

Citation reference: Harvey, L., 2004, Analytic Quality Glossary, Quality Research International, http://www.qualityresearchinternational.com/glossary/

This is a dynamic glossary and the author would welcome any e-mail suggestions for amendments or additions.

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Improvement

core definition

Improvement is the process of enhancing, upgrading or enriching the quality of provision or standard of outcomes.

explanatory context

Improvement is one of the purposes of quality in higher education, the other main purposes are accountability, control and compliance.

Quality improvement is, however, often used as a generic term to cover both quality and standard improvement. It is also a term used to imply both a rationale for quality processes (internal or external to the institution) and the actions undertaken by an institution following a quality evaluation event.

analytical review

CHEA (2001) for example defines quality improvement as:

The expectation that an institution will have in place a plan to monitor and improve the quality of its programs. In most cases, quality assurance and accrediting agencies require that established procedures ensure that this is an ongoing process.

Tempus (2001) links quality improvement to efficiency and enhanced benefits:

Quality Improvement – measures undertaken in order to increase efficiency of actions and procedures with the purpose of achieving additional benefits for the organisation and its users

Another approach talks about improvement orientation (of external quality evaluation).

Improvement orientation: Evaluation or assessment describing the strengths and weaknesses of a unit to facilitate improvement, and possibly including suggestions as to how to achieve it. (Campbell & Rozsnyai, 2002, p. 132)

Harvey (2002) summing up developments in quality evaluations notes:

External quality monitoring is also usually expected to lead to improvement: at the very least more transparent documentation. Monitoring might be specifically designed to encourage continuous improvement of the learning and teaching process. In some cases, such as the Swedish audits, it was designed to evaluate the quality improvement process by identifying improvement projects and evaluating their effectiveness. In any event, external monitoring is usually expected to result in better dissemination of (good) practice.

associated issues

Improvement and accountability

The relationship between improvement and accountability (be it manifested through assessment, audit or accreditation) has been the subject of extensive debate among commentators on higher education quality. The debates are of two broad types (a) whether improvement and accountability are the compatibility or incompatibility especially within the same quality review agency (b) the exploration of how accreditation and other forms of evaluation are encompassing an improvement element into their evaluation processes (Stensaker and Harvey, 2000). Woodhouse (1999, p. 39), for example argues that as accountability and improvement ‘are closely linked that it is more sensible to have the same agency sensitively attempting both than to try to separate them’.

There has been a long-running debate about the effectiveness of accountability-oriented approaches in securing improvement. That many systems of monitoring quality specifically emphasise improvement at the second stage of development of the monitoring process tends to suggest that improvement does not necessarily go hand-in-hand with accountability. Initially, in the UK, the Higher Education Quality Council (HEQC) had separate branches for ‘audit’ and for ‘enhancement’, which acknowledged the separation of accountability and improvement. The enhancement function faded away and when the HEQC was absorbed into the QAA it disappeared altogether. (Harvey, 2002)

related terms