Tertiary institutions must strengthen quality assurance systems

Professor George Kweku Oduro, the Pro-Vice Chancellor of the University Of Cape Coast (UCC), has urged tertiary institutions to strengthen their internal quality assurance systems to enhance the calibre of their products.

This, he said, would also help to meet the targets of their supervisory institutions.

He said quality assurance was the systematic review of educational programmes to ensure that acceptable standards of education, scholarship, finance and infrastructure were being upheld at all times.

Professor Oduro said this at the opening of a two-day training workshop for Quality Assurance officers of institutions affiliated to UCC.

The Training, organised by the Institutional Affiliation office and the Directorate of Academic Planning and Quality Assurance of the UCC, was attended by officers from 35 public and private tertiary institutions affiliated to UCC.

It seeks to equip participants to understand and differentiate concepts of quality, quality assurance and enhancement on the basis of their own experiences within the context of higher educational institutions.

He said quality assurance was essential in the governance, finance and infrastructure development of any tertiary institution and had a lot of impacts on higher education and national development.

He said strengthening systems was necessary because the certificates that the tertiary institutions issued out to their graduates were a living testimony of their credibility.

Tertiary institutions, therefore, must also not compromise on creating a better enabling environment for lecturing, he said, and urged the lecturers to use the required contents and standards that would be relevant to societal needs.

Professor Edward Marfo-Yiadom, the Chairman of the Committee for Institutional Affiliation, UCC, said universities were operating in a competitive complex, therefore, it was necessary for the UCC to ensure that its affiliated Universities pursued quality to cope with the competitive challenges.

He said the training was to ensure that their affiliate institutions operated in line with the criteria and standards set by the National Accreditation Board and to consolidate the gains made.

Professor Awusabo-Asare, the Director, Academic Planning and Quality Assurance of the UCC, advised the affiliate institutions to develop high ethical values and put in place stringent measures to ensure that their staff adhered to them.

He encouraged the universities to endeavour to deliver in line with changing trends and technologies and collaborate with other local and international institutions to meet the quality demands of the society.

He cautioned the institutions to be mindful of their admission policies, academic programmes, human and material resources and establish audit teams to evaluate their progress with time.