Evaluation and Accreditation of Higher Education Institutions in Bulgaria

1
Evaluation and Accreditation of Higher Education
Institutions in Bulgaria

• Prof. Ivan Panayotov, President of the Bulgarian
  National Evaluation and Accreditation Agency

2

• I. Short description of the Bulgarian higher
  education system (HES) in the context of the
  Eastern European countries (EEC)
• Brief historical recall
• Just after the liberation of the country, in
  October 1888 the first Bulgarian University of
  Sofia opened its doors. The Fathers of the
  Bulgarian University defined clearly its mission
  and priorities following the European models, and
  during the first fifty years many research groups
  and schools were founded and became partners of
  the leading European laboratories.
• When the totalitarian regime was established in
  Bulgaria, the higher education system consisted
  of one university and seven higher schools having
  a reputation for high quality. After some
  perturbations due to the inherence of the
  totalitarian power into the academic tasks and
  the restriction of academic autonomy, an
  intensive phase of development with high degree
  of overspecialization characterizes the period
  until the fall of the Berlin wall. Since 1989 the
  system has exploded, a number of new private
  universities have entered the market and the
  reputation for high quality of the higher
  education has been eroded.

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• Size and structure of the institutional network
• Table 1, Higher Education Institutions in
  Bulgaria by type and form of ownership (2004)

One feature of the Bulgarian Higher Education
system is the large number of institutions
relative to the size of the country, and the very
small size of a good many of these 17 have
fewer than 1000 students and 34 have fewer than
5000 students. As a consequence, the cost of the
HE is relatively high and academic coverage
relatively limited.
4

• Degree structure
• Table 2, National System of Higher Education
  Degrees

The national degree structure follows the Bologna
3-phases model.
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Table 3, Comparison with the size and degree
structures of HE system in Poland, Czech Republic
and Romania
The degree structure is similar in accordance
with the Bologna process. The so called intensity
indicator of Bulgaria is similar with those of
Czech Republic and Romania and smaller than in
Poland.
6
According to the current legislation, the
graduated with Master's degree may continue
higher education in the third Doctor's and
scientific degree in a scientific major listed in
the national classification containing 505
scientific specialities. Table 4Classification
of scientific specialitiesNatural Sciences,
Mathematics and computer Sci -
(98) Mathematics and Comp. Sci.
- 10 Mechanics
- 701.03 and 04 Physical Sci
- 2201.05
Chemical Sci
- 1501.06 Biological Sci
- 2201.07 and 08
Earth Sci
- 22 Technical Sciences
-
(206)Medical Sciences
-
(63)Agrarian Sciences
- (34)
Humanitarian and Social Sciences
- (104) Total Number

- (505)

• Doctoral studies

7
Table 5, Number of recipients of Doctor's degree
in Bulgaria, Poland and France (2001)
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II. Institutional evaluation and accreditation in
Bulgaria

• Introductory remarks
• The quality assessment of a Higher Education
  Institution (HEI) as a whole in order to
  determine whether or not it has met certain
  predetermined minimal criteria or standards is at
  the heart of the process of institutional
  evaluation and accreditation. The purpose of the
  evaluation is not only to prove but mainly to
  improve.
• From the theoretical point of view, the major
  disagreements revolve around three questions
• i. How should the evaluation and accreditation
• procedures be determined?
• ii. Who should participate in the evaluation
  and
• accreditation process?
• iii. What are the effects of accreditation?

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Institutional evaluation and accreditation is
often mistakenly viewed as a recent phenomenon.
It started in the US as an attempt to regulate
the American higher education sector
characterized by a mix of institutional types in
a competitive context. During the past decades,
accreditation procedures have been established in
Western Europe as a response to the combined
action of the rise of the mass of students and
consequently the presence of over peopled
underfunded universities and the traditionally
large institutional autonomy. After the fall of
the Berlin wall, the higher education in the
Eastern European countries (EEC) was undergoing
significant changes and reorganization as a
response to the well-known challenges of the
post-industrial information society and the need
to adapt the higher education to fundamental
changes in intellectual and social system
occurring after the end of the former
totalitarian system.
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There are some differences in the structure of
the higher education system (HES) and the
evaluation procedures in the EEC due to their
different historical, economic and cultural
traditions as well as there are some common
features and challenges i. Inhomogeneous HES
as a result of the proliferation of universities
created after the liberalization of the political
and social system of the EEC's. ii. Tendency
to maintain state control in the precarious
balance state control vs autonomy of the
universities. The way of exercising of the
state control in the EEC's varies slightly from
country to country, but in all countries the
national accreditation agencies were created and
both institutional and program accreditations
are maintained. iii. Underfunded, fragmented,
resistant to change HE institutions as a result
of the general deterioration of the financial
state of the eastern universities.
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Table 6, Institutional and programme
accreditation Object of accreditation
institutional accreditation, program
accreditation or a combination?
only master programmes
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• Structure and functions of the Bulgarian
  evaluation and accreditation agency (NEAA)
• In 1996 the Bulgarian government set up NEAA as
  the only national statutory body charged both
  with institutional and programme accreditation,
  evaluation of the projects for opening or
  transformation of HEI and post-accreditation
  monitoring and control of the capability of an
  institution to assure the quality of HE as well
  as whether the institution follows the
  recommendations in the evaluation report.
• The main evaluation and accreditation bodies of
  the Agency are the Accreditation Council, the 8
  Standing Committees in the main fields of higher
  education and the Standing Committee for
  Post-Accreditation Monitoring.

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The Accreditation Council consists of 10 members
and a President with a 6 years term of office.
The Accreditation Council approves nominations
for the members of the Standing Committees and
expert groups. The Council makes decisions about
the accreditation status of existing and newly
established institutions, faculties, branches and
programmes included in the list of regulated
professions. The Standing Committees are in
the main fields of study (Educational Sciences
Humanities and Arts Social Sciences, Law and
National Security Studies Economic Sciences and
Management Natural Sciences, Mathematics and
Computing Technical and Military Sciences
Healthcare and Sports Agrarian Sciences and
Veterinary Medicine). They consists of 3 to 7
representatives of universities who are subject
specialists in the respective field. The 8
committees nominate peer group members for site
visits and prepare them for the evaluation. They
make decisions about the accreditation of
programmes of study at different qualification
levels.
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The Standing Committee for Post-Accreditation
Monitoring is responsible for the organization of
follow-up audits. Review Peer Groups serve on
short-term contracts with the Agency. The
duration of contracts depends on the type of
procedure 5 months for ex ante evaluations and
12 months for ex post evaluations.
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• Institutional accreditation in Bulgaria follows
  the European practices
• The usual four-step approach is adopted
• 1. A self-evaluation report by the institution
  based on a handbook of criteria or standards
• 2. External evaluation based on a site visit by
  the team of external experts
• 3. Preparation of a final evaluation report by
  the corresponding standing committee
• 4. Decision-making by the Accreditation Council
• The evaluation is a matter of comparing the
  standards (how something should be) against the
  performances (how something actually is) yielding
  to find out the discrepancy information. The
  success of the evaluation process depends on the
  composition and the work of the team of external
  assessors.
• Who is an expert? What are the requirements
  concerning the expert teams?
• Are there international experts involved?
• Are the students involved in the evaluation
  procedures?

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Table 7, Student involvement in the
institutional processes
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• Accreditation in Bulgaria involves 4 types of
  procedures, designed to enable a decision about
  whether an institution or programme should be
  granted accredited status. These procedures are
  based on evaluation and accreditation of
• (i) an institution
• (ii) a subject of study at different
  qualification levels
• (iii) a single programme of study that is in the
  list of regulated professions
• (iv) a doctoral programme of study.
• NEAA also evaluates projects for establishment of
  new higher education institutions, new branches
  and faculties, new subjects and new programmes of
  study dealing with regulated professions. For
  these the Agency has a separate set of
  procedures.
• Depending on the type of request, the procedure
  starts and ends with a decision made either by
  the Accreditation Council, or by the respective
  Standing Committee.

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The Agency makes its evaluation and accreditation
decisions on the basis of (i) a four grades
scale of ratings, namely Very Good, Good,
Satisfactory and Non-satisfactory, when they
concern institutional or programme accreditation
procedures, and (ii) a Yes or No scale, when
they concern evaluation of projects for the
establishment of new institutions of programmes
study. Institutions or programmes
that are rated Very Good, Good receive 6
years term for their accreditation status. Those
rated Satisfactory receive 3 years term of
accreditation status.
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• NEAA's approach to the accreditation of doctoral
  programmes
• The universities that can offer doctoral programs
  should be carefully selected. The accreditation
  of a doctoral program by our agency is realized
  at two levels as an integral part of the
  institutional accreditation of the higher
  education institutions necessary for completeness
  of the evaluation of their teaching and research
  potential and by means of a subject evaluation of
  each scientific speciality listed in the
  Classification.

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• Among the criteria for the institutional
  accreditation, I will mention the following ones.
  
• Continuity of the faculty is ensured, including
  through training of doctoral and post-graduate
  students
  with the corresponding characteristics
• Ratio between the number of doctoral students and
  the number of habilitated faculty (average during
  the last 5 years)
• Ratio between the successful doctoral students
  and all doctoral students for the last five
  years.
• Faculty, students and doctoral students exchange
  and cooperation with other HE institutions is
  supported and expanded to promote teaching,
  research, expert, and creative activities to
  expand the educational profile of doctoral
  students through joint projects with
  international universities
  
  with the corresponding characteristics
• -Relative portion of doctoral students studying
  on joint projects with international universities
  and organizations

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It is important to note that according to the
Higher Education Act, only doctoral programs
obtained the maximal grade very good are
accredited. In a way of illustration the number
of accredited doctoral programs in 2003 is 146
and in 2004 254 (about 70 of the evaluated
programs).
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• The list of all institutionally accredited
  bulgarian HEI can be found on the official
  website of NEAA http//www.neaa.government.bg
• The new round of institutional reaccreditation
  with the new criteria starts in 2005. From 38 HEI
  applying for reaccredidation, 24 were rated very
  good, 11 good, 1 satisfactory and 2
  unsatisfactory.
• From 10 evaluated projects for establishment of
  new HEI, only one received approbation.
• The study program evaluation and accreditation
  offered in 52 broad fields of study introduced
  with the National Classification of Areas and
  Fields of study is now in progress.

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• Internationalization of higher education
• The international cooperation in the field of
  higher education is administrated and coordinated
  on the national level by the Council of Ministers
  and the Ministry of Higher Education and Science.
  The integration of Bulgarian higher education in
  the European and world processes and structures
  is coordinated and managed by the Departments
  European Integration and Bilateral Cooperation,
  Policy on Higher Education, Students and
  Specializing Postgraduates. They coordinate the
  Bulgarian participation in the European
  information network on higher education EURYDICE
  activities related to the European network on
  academic and professional recognition and
  mobility ENIC/NARIC the Central European
  Exchange Program for University Studies CEEPUS
  etc

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• Recognition of degrees and periods of study
• According to the Ordinance on the state
  requirements for recognition of higher education
  or periods of education completed at foreign
  higher schools the competent bodies to recognize
  higher education acquired and periods of
  education successfully completed at higher
  schools in a foreign country are the Minister of
  Higher Education and Science and the Rector of
  the respective higher school. The higher
  education recognition procedures are organized
  and carried out by the Ministry of Education and
  Science while taking into consideration the mode
  of student admission duration of study etc

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After 2000, the policy of the Ministry of Higher
Education and Science has been related to the
distribution of information materials and
promoting the main instruments of recognition
the Diploma Supplement and the European Credit
Transfer and Accumulation System. Bulgaria
introduces the Diploma Supplement in practice in
2004 when the Ordinance on the state requirements
on the content of the basic documents issued by
the higher education institutions was adopted. By
doing so the country fulfilled one of the
objectives that the Berlin Ministerial Conference
on higher education set after 2005 every
student should receive a Diploma Supplement
automatically and free of charge. The amendments
to HEA made in 2004 obliged higher schools to
introduce systems for credit accumulation and
transfer from the beginning of the academic year
2004/2005.
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In conclusion, the quality of higher education is
a function of the quality and a good interaction
between all actors (teachers-researchers,
agencies, the Ministry, heads of HEI, public and
private partners, students, professionals,
families, society in general). We believe that
our national agency has to play a crucial role to
ensure a minimum level of quality for
institutions and programs, to enhance the quality
and to provide public information in appropriate
manner.