QUALITY CONCEPTION IN HIGHER EDUCATION LEGISLATION: THE ESTONIAN NATIONAL PROFILE

The main goal of this paper is to analyse the concept of “quality“ which is used quite often in texts of legislation of public universities. The paper provides an analytical overview of the development of Estonian higher education and related legislation focussing particularly quality assurance within public universities following the regaining of independence and accession to the European Union. The paper presents results of empirical data collected through analysis of the following documents – Universities Act; Standard of Higher Education; Regulation of the Government of the Republic “Procedure for Accreditation of Universities, Institutions of Professional Higher Education and their Curricula and Requirements for Accreditation”; Estonian Higher Education Strategy for 2006-2015. The paper's main conclusions include that the concept of quality of higher education remains undefined in the legislative acts of public universities, which, in turn makes it complicated for them to meet quality-related expectations. It can be further maintained that, at the state level, concepts of quality in higher education refer to the conformity to requirements/standards and value for money. In the context of a multitude of different approaches and stakeholders the process of establishment of a public university quality assurance system in this manner is too narrowly focussed. The conceptualisation of quality should be widened and clarified at the state level as to what universities are expected to do when creating their internal quality assurance systems.