QAA at 25: Championing UK quality and standards for a quarter of a century

To mark a quarter of a century as the UK’s independent quality body and in our capacity as a membership organisation, QAA will facilitate a series of conversations exploring quality from a range of perspectives. These conversations will be stimulated by experts from across the UK and international higher education including academic leaders, students, quality agencies and other sector bodies.

Our starting point will be the central question - ‘What does quality really mean in practice in a complex and rapidly changing sector?’. Over the course of the year, QAA will unpack the definition in all its aspects, in partnership with the sector, and explore the implications for everyone in UK higher education, wider society and internationally.

Some of the questions we will be asking are:

• How can we keep driving quality enhancement forward?
• Where do we locate value for money on the quality continuum?
• How can students act as co-creators of the quality of their higher education experience?
• How do we close the participation gap when levelling up through access?
• Does size really matter for a high-quality higher education experience?

QAA’s Chief Executive Vicki Stott commented: ‘Across 2022, we will be taking the opportunity to reflect on 25 years of learning about quality and standards to lead a conversation about what quality means in practice. Through our anniversary programme, we aim to provide a forum for cross-sector discussion on what the future holds for higher education quality.’

We will be kicking off the QAA at 25 series this month with an analysis of what defines quality across the UK’s diverse higher education landscape by QAA’s CEO Vicki Stott, which will be published by the Higher Education Policy Institute (HEPI). 

This will be followed by a number of events throughout the year. Join the conversation by using #QAA25.