Quality in cross-border higher education and challenges for the internationalization of national quality assurance agencies in the Asia-Pacific region: the Taiwanese experience

Abstract

Cross-border higher education has created a need to build capacity – particularly in the internationalization dimension – for national quality assurance agencies to evaluate cross-border education provided by foreign educational providers, or jointly by local and foreign institutions. This is quickly becoming a key issue in the Asia-Pacific region. National accrediting agencies in Asia, which implement accrediting tasks domestically, are attempting to internationalize themselves through internal and external approaches. The main purpose of this article is to analyze the impact of this cross-border accreditation on national quality assurance agencies in the Asia-Pacific region. The approaches that national quality assurance agencies adopt to enhance their internationalization are discussed, as are the efforts the regional networks make to help Asian quality assurance agencies build capacity. Taiwan's case and the challenges it is faced with are also addressed.

Keywords:

• cross-border higher education
• international accreditation
• quality assurance
• Taiwanese higher education