The leading experts in education from EU universities are involved in the project. The participants of the project are European and Russian universities and HEI Associations: the University of Genova (Italy), Consortium of Universities CINECA (Bologna, Italy), Conference of Italian University Rectors (Rome, Italy), Polytechnic University of Catalonia (Barcelona, Spain), Slovak University of Technology (Bratislava, Slovakia), Kaunas University of Technology. The Russian Federation is represented by Ministry of Education and Science, partner universities in Moscow, Tambov, Tomsk, Saint-Petersburg, Ekaterinburg, Kirov, Volgograd, Astrakhan and Rostov-on-Don. As the project is a structural measure, the Ministry of Education and Science RF is obligatory and integral part of the project running.
Aim of the project: to promote the improvement of the quality of technological study programmes (SPs) through the introduction of an internal quality assurance (iQA) system focused on the definition of learning outcomes and the definition and implementation of an online documentation and monitoring system of the quality of SPs consistent with the Standards and Guidelines for QA in the European Higher Education Area (ESG).
The leading EU professors such as Alfredo Squarzoni, European expert in Quality Assurance in EHEA (Genoa, Italy), Angelo Musaio, EQUASP Project coordinator (Genoa, Italy) and Massimo Rimondi, expert in on-line documentation of study programmes, non-profit consortium CINECA (Bologna, Italy) have participated in the seminar and shared their experience and best practices in QA of SPs. The seminar took place on 27-28 of September 2016 in Don State Technical University.
The project team has developed EQUASP software for the on-line documentation of the information and data for QA of SPs. Each partner university has uploaded several BA and MA programmes carried out at their universities, to the software as the pilot testing. The software structure meets European Standards and Guidelines for QA in the European Higher Education Area (ESG) and enables to compare study programmes at national and international levels. The software users can easily find online data the SP realization concerned such as study papers, analytical information, students’ progress records, statistics on students’ employability, employers satisfaction surveys data, etc.
Study programmes description is presented in Russian and English, that promotes Russian education internationalization strategy.
The seminar at DSTU was devoted to the presentation, discussion and sharing of the improvements of both the software and SPs’ documentation, and preparation of the Final Conference of the project.