ASSESSING AND EVALUATING AN INDIVIDUAL'S HIGHER EDUCATION

My purpose is to raise a number of questions concerning the nature of what is being assessed and evaluated by the contributors to this Journal. I also wish to challenge a number of the assumptions concerning the concept of Higher Education which is implicit in the work of these contributors.

I will be arguing that important dimensions of Higher Education are being omitted from the Journal, not because they do not concern the contributors, but because of the prevailing view of knowledge in institutions of Higher Education. My particular concern is that the aesthetic dimensions of the concept of Higher Education are omitted from the Journal. I am thinking specifically of the quality of human relationship in education within which the unity of humanity is not violated.     

QUALITY ASSESSMENT IN HIGHER EDUCATION: ISSUES AND CONCERNS

Although quality in higher education is hard to define and to identify, there is growing concern about it at national and international levels. The work of CEPES, particularly its proposal to create a European Group on Academic Assessment (EGAA), and the work of OECD, particularly its Institutional Management in Higher Education Programme (IMHE), respond to this concern. Approaches to quality assessment in the United States, Japan, and Sweden are evoked.     

OBSTACLES TO THE IMPLEMENTATION OF PRINCIPLE OF LIFELONG EDUCATION IN HIGHER EDUCATION

The idea that higher studies are confined to a few years of one's early life and separated from later periods of work, is being changed, by the thought that the periods of study and gainful employment can be suitably interspaced throughout the adult life span, to the. advantage of both the individual and society. However, the implementation of the principle of lifelong education will not come about until many barriers and habits have been overcome in higher education, the world of work and public opinion. These problems, mainly in the context of higher education, are analyzed in the following article, which is based on a paper by Dr. M.M. Chambers of the Department of Educational Administration, Illinois State University (USA). The paper was presented during the 4th International Conference on Higher Education held at the University of Lancaster, UK (29 August ‐‐ 1 September 1978).     

INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCES ON HIGHER EDUCATION AND THEIR CONTRIBUTION TO THE DEVELOPMENT OF HIGHER EDUCATION

Quite a large number of international meetings devoted to issues concerning higher education are organized each year. The problems of their contribution to the further development of higher education and research in this field are raised in a thought‐provoking article written for “Higher Education in Europe” by Professor E.A. van Trotsenburg, President of the European Association for Research and Development in Higher Education (EARDHE) and Director of the Institute of International Science and University Didactics, University of Klagenfurt.     

RESPONSE OF US HIGHER EDUCATION TO EDUCATIONAL NEEDS OF FOREIGN STUDENTS

The questions of what foreign students expect from higher education institution of the host country and how, if at all, their institute is accommodating the specific needs of foreign students in terms of education that relates to development problems at home, are analyzed in the following article, in the context of higher education in the United States.

The article based on a speech given by Harold L. Enarson, President of Ohio State University, at the 1979 Conference on International Education: “International Education‐The Global Context, The U.S. Role”. The conference which was organized by the Institute of International Education was held from 26 to 28 February 1979 in Washington D.C., and was attended by over 800 academic, business, and governmental leaders. The aim of the conference was to help give direction and unity to efforts on behalf of international education for the decade ahead.     

AUTONOMY AND DEPENDENCE IN THE ADMINISTRATION OF HIGHER EDUCATION

In the more developed countries, the twin concepts of academic freedom and university autonomy have been the bedrock of university administration and development. These concepts have become the characteristic features of modern universities because of the special functions they are called upon to perform over time. Critical to the specialist function of universities are the three P's, namely: (i) the profession of truth and knowledge through teaching; (ii) the promotion of truth and knowledge through research and (iii) the protection of truth and knowledge. Of immediate relevance to these functions is university autonomy which is an essential element for freedom in the search for truth and knowledge. Thus, the normative framework of academic freedom and university autonomy presupposes that academics are effective once these privileges are guaranteed. Supposedly, the opposite is the case should these factors of university administration be absent; hence, we can equally speak of dependence.

Against this conflicting background, this article examines the situation in Nigeria in the context of autonomy, freedom, and dependence in the administration of higher education in selected countries.     

HIGHER EDUCATION AND ENVIRONMENTAL EDUCATION IN LIGHT OF THE RESULTS AND RECOMMENDATIONS OF THE TBILISI CONFERENCE

Promotion of environmental education in higher education and Unesco activities in this context, especially in light of the work and recommendations of the Intergovernmental Conference on Environmental Education, are presented in the following article.

It was written for “Higher Education in Europe” by Victor Kolybine from the Environmental Education Section of Unesco.     

THE DEVELOPMENT AND THE PRESENT SITUATION OF ENVIRONMENTAL EDUCATION IN GREEK HIGHER EDUCATION

This article gives a bird's eye view of tertiary level environmental education programmes in Greece. As the author points out, environmental education in this country got off to a late start because of a late perception of the need for them. By the end of the 1980's, environmental components had been introduced into teacher training programmes, into the universities both as full course programmes in certain universities and as enrichment courses in most of them, and into the offerings of adult and vocational education. What has evolved is a satisfactory and pragmatic range of offerings to which more must be added to meet increased demand.     

AXIOMS CONCERNING THE DEVELOPMENT OF HIGHER EDUCATION/ AND ATTENDANT MEANS OF EVALUATING ITS EFFECTIVENESS

"A modern society which does not give the highest priority to the intellectual development of its people has no future”. Alfred North Whitehead     

EUROPEAN HIGHER EDUCATION AND THE ISSUES OF TRADITION,TRANSFER‐CREDIT,AND CREDIBILITY

This article discusses the possibilities and pitfalls of international credit transfer among higher education institutions. Credit transfer is skewed by varying definitions of what education actually is and even more so by the overwhelming power of one of the Anglo‐Saxon players, the United States of America, the cultural and educational traditions of which are so difficult to resist as to be a form of cultural imperialism. Thus, the overwhelming use of English as the principal international language of education presents a threat to the educational diversity of Europe as does the adoption of such measures of credit transfer as the European Community Course Credit Transfer Scheme (ECTS), a surface Americanization that fails to appreciate the realities of European, specifically Austrian, course programmes. The author would prefer a qualification recognition system based on a refinement of the concepts underlying the so‐called diploma supplement that would give essential information about what the given credential means and what was required to earn it.     

HIGHER EDUCATION AND THE CONCEPT OF LIFELONG EDUCATION

The following article does not give a complete answer to the above question nor does it define the concept of lifelong education, but it shows the place and the role of lifelong education in the system of education.

The article is based on the first chapter of the study written by James B. Ingram, Director of the B. Ed. Course at Bradford College (the United Kingdom) in collaboration with the Unesco Division of Educational Structures, Contents and Methods and the Unesco Institute for Education in Hamburg.     

IAU SEMINAR ON THE RIGHT TO EDUCATION AND ACCESS TO HIGHER EDUCATION

The right to education has been solemnly proclaimed by the United Nations and, in many countries, it is explicitly recognized in the constitutions or legislation.

The real problems are: the exercise of this right and the extent to which it can be seen to be a reality in different types of society; the international consequences of inequalities and differences in stages of development between countries in these matters.

Higher education is not a universal right and cannot be so in the foreseeable future, in many countries. An increasingly large proportion of the relevant age group already considers it “normal” to enter higher education and the time may well come when everyone will be expected to receive some post‐secondary education. Pressure may then be exerted to seek the transformation of this “normal” situation into a legal norm so that the right to education will then come to be interpreted as a right to higher education or post‐secondary education. Although this is not yet the case it may be wise to try to foresee the consequences of such an evolution both for the educational system and for society.

In this context the Vth Seminar of the International Association of Universities (IAU) which was held from 29 May to 2 June 1978 in Halle (GDR) concentrated its discussion on the following topics:

• the right to education for professional employment and the right to education for its own sake; the consequences for access to higher education;

• the specific role of the university in the exercise of the right to education;

• international aspects of access to higher education.

We present below an edited version of the Seminar's aide‐mémoire on its discussion.