Composition of the Board
In line with a recommendation expressed by the External Review Team that evaluated MusiQuE in July 2015, MusiQuE has recently created a new permanent seat reserved for a student member of the Board. Following an open call launched in August 2017 among AEC member institutions and two selection rounds, the MusiQuE Board is very pleased to welcome Rosa Welker as student member of the Board.
Current Board member Helena Maffli will step down from the Board after the Spring 2018 meeting. The Board and staff members would like to thank Helena for her commitment and work for MusiQuE in its first years of operation. EMU Managing Director Timo Klemettinen will replace Helena on the Board as EMU-mandated member from the next meeting onwards.
Strategic Plan and Business plan
The Board has worked on a Strategic Plan 2018-2025, consisting of three main pillars:
1.Turning MusiQuE into the “go-to-provider” for external quality assurance in higher music education
2. Promoting the subject-specific dimension of quality assurance
3. Strengthening MusiQuE’s organisational structure
The objectives set out in the Strategic Plan are being further underpinned by MusiQuE’s Business Plan and Risk Management Strategy, which are being reviewed on an ongoing basis.
The Board has decided it will prepare an application to the European Quality Assurance Register for Higher Education (EQAR) to renew MusiQuE’s registration. MusiQuE’s current registration on EQAR is valid until 2020.
Addition of new services to MusiQuE’s portfolio
MusiQuE carries out evaluations of research activities undertaken by higher music education institutions. In this context, the Board has approved the recently developed ‘MusiQuE Framework for the Evaluation of Research Activities’. The Framework has now been made publically available and can be found for download here.
Improvement of MusiQuE’s procedures
The Board continues to discuss and plan concrete actions in order to follow the recommendations addressed by the External Review Team that evaluated MusiQuE in July 2015, by the EQAR Committee and by MusiQuE’s external evaluator. MusiQuE has welcomed a student member to its Board and continues to work on its financial sustainability.
Consideration of review reports
The Board members scrutinised the review reports that had been finalised since the last Board meeting in October 2017. For reports of Quality Enhancement Reviews, the consistency with, and relevance to, the review standards was considered. For accreditation procedures, the Board checked if the justifications listed by the review team for each standard supported the proposed level of compliance with that standard. The Board then took the final formal decision on the accreditation of the institution/programme/joint programme based on the proposal of the Review Team.
The reports of the following procedures were considered:
- Programme Accreditation, Performing and Visual Arts Programmes and Music Programmes, Kazakh National University of Arts – undertaken in cooperation with EQ-Arts (Site-visit in March 2017) (formal endorsement of the Board’s decision taken during e-mail consultation in December 2017 / January 2018)
- Programme Accreditation, Bachelor of Music, Royal Conservatoire The Hague (Site visit in June 2016)
- Programme Review, Estonian Academy of Music and Theatre (Site-visit in November 2017) (considered during skype meeting on 18 April 2018)
- Programme Accreditation, Escola Superior de Musica de Lisboa, Instituto Polytechnico Lisboa (Site-visit in December 2017) (considered during skype meeting on 18 April 2018)
MusiQuE Peer-reviewers Register and Training Session
In the aftermath of the MusiQuE Training, 11 applications from peers with an interest in being listed on the Peer-reviewers Register were accepted. The Board also decided to create a new Student Reviewer Register, in which students who have been trained by MusiQuE are being listed.
External evaluation of MusiQuE
The Board was joined during the meeting by MusiQuE’s external evaluator, Mr. Stefan Delplace. Mr. Deplace shared his observations on topics such as MusiQuE’s compliance with the ESG, the possible renewal of MusiQuE’s EQAR registration and MusiQuE’s future perspectives.
The Board decided to extend the term of Stephan Deplace as external evaluator for another two years (2018-2020).
The further development of MusiQuE’s activities in Europe was discussed
MusiQuE is continuously exploring the situation of higher music education institutions with regard to quality assurance and accreditation at national level to determine in which countries it can be of assistance to the institutions and in which way. National quality assurance agencies are being approached to explore opportunities for joint procedures. In this context, MusiQuE was represented at the Members’ Forum of the European Association for Quality Assurance in Higher Education (ENQA) in Zaragoza, Spain, on 19-20 April 2018, to meet with representatives of national agencies from all over Europe.
