(1889) EXPLORING ACADEMICS' PERCEPTIONS OF THE NEW HIGHER EDUCATION EVALUATION POLICY IN TAIWAN

摘要

The issue of student learning outcomes has become an important trend in the global higher education,and many higher education institutions, quality assurance and accreditation organisations are asked toprovide concrete evidence to demonstrate and communicate with stakeholders such as expectedstudents, academic communities, employers and policy makers. Higher education institutions mustensure that students have attained key learning outcomes and have met academic standards duringtheir university experiences. Since 2012, the Foundation for Higher Education Evaluation andAccreditation Council of Taiwan (HEEACT) has been conductin the second 5-year cycle of highereducation evaluation within 84 universities and colleges. The main purpose of this ongoing evaluationis to examine whether each department and graduate school can establish a quality assurancemechanism to ensure student learning outcomes and put the mechanisms into practice. Thus, the aimof this research is to explore academics' perceptions of the new higher education evaluation policy inTaiwan. This empirical research is a case study involving one purposively selected university, and indepth,semi-structured qualitative interviews were conducted with 10 academics. Most participantswork in the field of education and they are at the different levels- university, faculty and department. Athematic analysis approach was used to analyse data collected from interviews. Also, documentsincluding the national quality assurance policies, the case university's public meeting minutes andinternal quality assurance strategies related to student learning outcomes were analysed via anethnographic content analysis method. The main research findings argued that the quality assurancemechanisms for student learning outcomes potentially influence on academics' teaching and learning,curriculum and assessment methods. Further, academics presented positive and negative opinions ofimplementing the quality assurance mechanisms and suggestions for the improvements of thesystems.