The Association of African Universities is pleased to invite Higher Education (HE) quality experts to apply to take part in the 2018 African Quality Rating Mechanism (AQRM) Institutional Evaluations Verification/Validation process. Please access the AAU AQRM CALL FOR QA EXPERTS Concept Note

THE QUALITY ASSURANCE EXPERTS’ MAIN TASKS

1. Carefully read and analyse the assigned AQRM institutional questionnaires of two universities that have participated in the AQRM survey.
2. Participate in three-day visits to each university they are assigned to in order to tour university campus(es) and inspect buildings, classrooms, laboratories, libraries, computer centers, facilities and evaluate the quality of infrastructure, material resources and the overall environment.
3. Evaluate the quality of student support services and the overall academic staff profile (qualifications and rank).
4. Inspect relevant documents, as appropriate and as provided by the university at hand
5. Hold meetings with senior management, academic staff, students and other key stakeholders to get more insight into the university situation.
6. Evaluate internal quality assurance processes of the university. The evaluation will take into account the AQRM survey questionnaires responses.
7. Based on findings, validate the self-rating of the university and assign an overall Quality Rating to the institution.
8. Provide recommendations on modalities and approaches for improving quality of the university’s education provision and the general improvement of the universities’ internal QA procedures and systems.
9. The QA Experts will be required to do an oral report presentation before leaving the institution and produce a written draft report 2 weeks after leaving the institution and send it to AAU.
10. AAU will send the draft report to each respective institution for input in track changes. The institution then returns the draft to AAU which sends the draft report to experts for final clean up.
11. The experts then submit the final report to AAU which then sends the final report to the respective institution.

REQUIRED HIGHER EDUCATION QUALITY EXPERTS QUALIFICATIONS

1. A relevant postgraduate qualification.

2.  At least 10 years of experience in the area of HE quality assurance or management.
3. Relevant knowledge and experience in HE quality assessments.
4. Experience in HE quality audits and accreditation evaluations.
5. Good communication skills in speaking and writing English and/or French. A good command of other AU languages (Portuguese and Arabic) is additional advantage.
6. Excellent interpersonal skills and proficiency in preparing evaluation reports.

HOW TO APPLY

1.Interested and qualified HE quality experts are invited to complete the online application form in this link: _{https://www.research.net/r/AAUExp}

2. Apply before 30^th December 2017
3. Applicants are kindly requested to include information relating to their knowledge and experience in Higher Education Quality Assurance, Program Assessment, Institutional Quality Audit, and Accreditation Exercise.

MORE INFORMATION

1. Shortlisted candidates will be contacted within two weeks of the application deadline.
2. Teams of international quality experts (One AAU member, one African and one European Expert) will be set up to undertake the verification/validation missions. Each team of quality experts will ideally visit two universities from one African country. Each mission is expected to last for three days
3. Before the evaluation visits, selected experts will be asked to participate in a 2-day preparatory workshop in January 2018 in Accra Ghana.
4. April 2018: AAU allocates and sends the completed AQRM surveys to experts selected for the AQRM Evaluation visits. The experts read through the AQRM surveys and if necessary, they raise questions to seek clarification from the universities in question.
5. May-November 2018: Experts do the verification/validation visits to institutions where at the end of their visit they give an oral report to the institutions and submit draft reports to AAU. The draft reports are sent to institutions for input in track changes. The institution returns the draft report to AAU which passes it on to experts who do the final report and send it to AAU. AAU then sends the final report to institutions.
6. A modest perdiem to cover local travel costs and full board hotel accommodation will be paid to each quality expert during the missions. An additional honorarium will be paid to the experts team for the evaluation report writing. Flights and visa fees will also be covered by AAU.
7. Visits will be conducted in English (for English, Arabic and Portuguese speaking institutions) and in French for French speaking institutions. Expert teams may include one Arabic and one Portuguese speaker in needed.

CONTACT INFORMATION

1. For any technical challenges contact Frank Asefuah on: fasefuah@aau.org

+233 548 880 855

2. For any other questions about the whole exercise contact Dr. Violet Makuku on vmakuku@aau.org vmakuku@gmail.com +233 263 129 798

The Steps for the African Quality Rating Mechanism (AQRM) Audit Process required from interested institutions is made available here for general information – STEPS TO BE FOLLOWED DURING AUDIT PROCESS 

Read more about AAU from www.aau.org and www.blog.aau