Quality and Accreditation in Engineering Education in Europe

Since the 2005 Ministers' Conference in Bergen. that adopted the "European Standards and Guidelines for Quality Assurance in the European Higher Education Area " ("ESG"). Quality Assurance (QA) of Higher Education (HE) has become a major objective of the "Bologna Process". the process that aims at harmonizing HE throughout Europe. At present, QA Agencies (or analogous bodies) exist, in practically every country of the European Union (and in most of the 47 countries of the European HE Area-EHEA), and the "European Quality Assurance Register of Higher Education" (EQAR) has been established. This is, indeed, a great positive progress, because of the contribution that QA can give to the general improvement of Higher Education.

However, QA often tends to assess more the "process" than the "contents" of the education: therefore, especially in subjects that lead towards a "profession" ("engineering" first among them), the practice of "accreditation" is also increasing throughout the world. In "accrediting" higher education, different approaches are possible: in particular, "programme" and "institutional". However. the two approaches are not in contrast, but on the contrary can usefully complement each other.

Two recent initiatives in programme approach, will be quoted in the last part of the paper. First, the EUR-ACE^® system for the "European accreditation of engineering programmes" at the Bachelor and Master levels, run by the " European Network for the Accreditation of Engineering Education" (ENAEE) since 2006. Second. the Foundation ill November 2011 of the "European Alliance for Subject-Specific and Professional Accreditation and Quality Assurance" (EASPA), the European analogous of the older American "Association of Specialized and Professional Accreditors" (ASPA).