The Seventh Annual Conference of Experts in Higher Education "Implementation of the European Standards and Guidelines for Quality Assurance Systems" took place in Moscow on 09-10 November 2012.

The Seventh Annual Conference of Experts in Higher Education "Implementation of the European Standards and Guidelines for Quality Assurance Systems" took place in Moscow on 09-10 November 2012.

The conference brought together more than 150 representatives of the academic community, among them Rectors and Vice-Rectors, Department Heads, experts in the field of professional education and foreign experts.

The first day of the Conference was opened by Nikolay Maximov, President of the Guild of Experts in Higher Education, Chair of the Coordinating Council of Russian Associations for Training and Methodology and Councils for Science and Methodology, and Evgeny Semchenko, Deputy Head of the Quality Assessment Department of the Federal Service for Supervision in Education and Science.

During the Conference the participants discussed the issues related to quality assurance in education: the achievements and the perspectives. Vladimir Shadrikov, Chair of the Expert Council of the State Duma of the Russian Federation, Director of the Institute of Contents of Education (The Higher School of Economics - National Research University), and Galina Motova, Deputy Director of the National Centre of Public Accreditation, Editor-in-chief of the Journal “Accreditation in Education” made presentations devoted to these issues.

Sergey Gerasimov, Director of the Accreditation Centre of the Association for Engineering Education of Russia (AEER) presented the outcomes of comparative analysis of European and Russian education support schemes.

Olga Oleynikova, Director of the National Tempus Office in the Russian Federation, shared the information on contribution of the Tempus programme to modernisation of Russian higher education.

Irina Arzhanova, Director of the National Training Foundation, spoke about rankings being a tool for quality assessment of HEIs’ activities.

Evgeny Semchenko, Deputy Head of the Quality Assessment Department of the Federal Service for Supervision in Education and Science	Olga Oleynikova, Director of the National Tempus Office in Russia	Vladimir Shadrikov, Chair of the Expert Council of the State Duma of the Russian Federation
Irina Arzhanova, Director of the National Training Foundation	Marina Skiba, Expert of the National Accreditation Center of the Ministry of Education and Science of the Republic of Kazakhstan	Sergey Gerasimov, Director of the Accreditation Centre of the Association for Engineering Education of Russia

Marina Skiba, Head of the Quality Management Department of T. Ryskulov Kazakh Economic University (Republic of Kazakhstan), Expert of the National Accreditation Center of the Ministry of Education and Science of the Republic of Kazakhstan (NAC), made a presentation on the issues related to quality of education in Kazhakhstan.

Vladimir Navodnov, Director of the National Centre of Public Accreditation, covered the issues related to development of public accreditation of study programmes in Russia.

Vladimir Navodnov, Director of the National Centre of Public Accreditation	Galina Motova, Deputy Director of the National Centre of Public Accreditation

The participants of the Conference had the opportunity to get acquainted with the international experience of the development of external quality assurance systems in Europe and Asia.

The participants showed a particular interest in the presentation made by Achim Hopbach, President of the European Association for Quality Assurance in Higher Education (ENQA), Director of the Agency for Quality Assurance and Accreditation Austria (AQ Austria), which was devoted to the theme “Quality assurance in the European Higher Education Area: Current state and future perspectives”.

Josep Grifoll, Head of the Quality Assessment Department in Catalan University Quality Assurance Agency (AQU Catalunya), ENQA Board member, made presentations on the themes “Quality Assurance for Higher Education: Looking for new strategies? A view from Catalonia” and “Quality assurance for university degrees in Catalonia”.
 
Jana Bekker, Special Representative for Russia of the Foundation for International Business Administration Accreditation (FIBAA), spoke about the current trends in the development of the German accreditation system.

Achim Hopbach, President of the European Association for Quality Assurance in Higher Education (ENQA)	Josep Grifoll, Head of the Quality Assessment Department in Catalan University Quality Assurance Agency (AQU Catalunya), ENQA Board member

All the presentations aroused great interest among the participants of the event. Each speaker was asked many questions. The issues discussed during the panel sessions stimulated heated discussions even during the breaks.

On the final day of the Conference Galina Motova, Director of the Russian Guild of Experts in HE and TVET, made a report on the performance of the Guild in 2012 and shared the plans of the organisation for the coming year.

More information is available on the website of The Russian Guild of Experts.