MusiQuE gave a successful poster presentation, entitled “Will subject-specific international agencies help to bridge the gap between quality assurance, teachers and students?”, at the 7th ENQA General Assembly, which took place in Gloucester, United Kingdom, on 20-21 October 2016. The poster, which is available for download here, addresses a much debated issue in the world of quality assurance: how to make quality assurance activities more meaningful to students and teachers. MusiQuE’s approach to this issue is to create a common language based on a concept of quality culture which addresses both (artistic) standards and educational quality.

Based on the experiences and views of MusiQuE as a European-level subject-specific agency, the participants of the ENQA General Assembly were encouraged to reflect on the following challenges:

•    How can generic and subject-specific agencies work together to create a common understanding of quality assurance bringing back together content and process, and to create a common language understandable for students and teachers?
•    How can agencies develop innovative methods of review that go beyond the ‘classic’ review model in order to increase interaction with students and teachers, decrease the workload of institutions for quality assurance activities, and enable the development of more meaningful recommendations for improvement?

The poster presentation highlighted the benefits of MusiQuE’s answers to these challenges. The presentation also offered an opportunity for MusiQuE to meet representatives of national agencies from all over Europe and to further explore the situation of higher music education institutions with regard to quality assurance and accreditation at national level.