Student Experts in Quality Assurance learn about DEQAR
During the training for future Quality Assurance Student Experts organised by the European Students’ Union (ESU), one of the newest things learned by participants was the existence of the Database of External Quality Assurance Reports (DEQAR).
The gathering of around 30 European student-experts in Riga between the 4-6th of October was a great chance to spread awareness among students about DEQAR and discuss how they can use it as experts. We were happy to welcome during the meeting Kathy Mathe from DEQAR to have a detailed session about the database as well as host a user-testing session for students.
Many of the students found it to be a very helpful platform and they were happy to learn about it. Some of the participants gave their positive feedback about this tool*:
‘DEQAR was good, I will use it as a source of information to improve my local agency and QA system’
‘Using the DEQAR website I also got many ideas for the QA training in my home country’
‘I did not expect to gain skills of using that data platform in general! And I am happy about it!’
After the training, when the participants were back home, they kept using the platform for their QA work:
‘Since I have used the Database of External Quality Assurance Results (DEQAR) for the first time, I come back to it more and more frequently. It is a useful and trusted tool which helps to find all relevant information regarding quality assurance in the European Higher Education Area (EHEA). Without the register, my work would be tedious, time-consuming and not giving so much satisfaction’ says Damian Michalik, one of the participants in the training and user of DEQAR.
About DEQAR
The aim of the Database of External Quality Assurance Reports (DEQAR) project is the development of a database that will enhance access to reports and decisions on higher education institutions/programmes externally reviewed against the European Standards and Guidelines (ESG), by an EQAR-registered agency.
The project is co-funded by the EU programme Erasmus+ Key Action 3 – European Forward-Looking Cooperation Projects.
More information can be found at DEQAR website, and the Database can be consulted here.
*Source: Mentimeter, used to evaluate the participants’ experience in the QA Student Experts training. DEQAR was the most mentioned aspect when answering the question of what did they learn during the training that was unexpected.
