Title: Need of a semi-self evaluation scheme for education in Electrical/Computer Engineering in Europe

Authors: Michael Logothetis

Addresses: Wire Communications Laboratory, Electrical and Computer Engineering Department, University of Patras, Patras 265 04, Greece

Abstract: Several studies have already been carried out worldwide on the Quality of (engineering) Education (QoE) and the Quality of Vocational Training (QoVOT) due to the urgency of reforms in both areas. However, these studies either refer to individual academic institutions or evaluate universities by comparing each other on a national basis only, or report loosely the general level of QoE within a country, or present the educational systems of different countries providing data without conclusions. Moreover, although most of these studies are carried out by independent experts, the resultant recommendations, in many cases, are not adopted by the academic institutes, unless the academic institutions are obliged by an accreditation board to adopt them. Taking the above into consideration, the aim of this paper is to propose a semi-self evaluation scheme for an in-depth evaluation of the QoE and QoVOT on a trans-European basis and produce sound conclusions. To accomplish this effectively, we need to restrict the evaluation to a specific engineering field, as is the Electrical/Computer Engineering and the cooperation of a number of the European universities from different countries, with educational systems differently structured.

Keywords: benchmarks; criteria; evaluation; indicators; quality of education; QoE; semi-self evaluation; vocational training; electrical engineering; computer engineering; engineering education; Europe; higher education.

DOI: 10.1504/IJCEELL.2008.019646

International Journal of Continuing Engineering Education and Life-Long Learning, 2008 Vol.18 No.4, pp.480- 491

Published online: 18 Jul 2008 *

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