Overseas franchise warning

BRITISH universities and colleges involved in a burgeoning multi-billion pound overseas partnerships and franchising market have been warned to tighten their controls on quality.

Most students on courses developed through overseas partnerships are getting a good deal but systems for managing the quality of those courses are inadequate to protect the students' long-term interests, says the Higher Education Quality Council.

Council auditors checked arrangements for monitoring the quality of programmes run in collaboration by British universities and colleges and institutions in Greece, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Singapore, and Spain. They found "a reasonably reassuring picture" of current practice, but "no room for complacency".

A report published this week says the findings from visits overseas "do not point to any immediate threat to the maintenance of quality and standards". But in many cases the quality and strength of the partnerships "owe much to the energy and commitment of individuals" rather than clear and formally agreed quality assurance frameworks.

Quality controls were particularly variable in systems for securing consistent assessment, rules for controlling promotional material and arrangements for identifying responsibilities and safeguarding the interests of students where partnerships are cut off.

The auditors found that in some cases links were established on the basis of "modest" information about the prospective partner.

They also found instances where "seemingly modest entry requirements" appeared to admit students to the partner institution followed by swift passage through a programme locally-taught to entry into the final year of a UK honours degree.

The report warns: "This gives the impression of different standards being applied for the overseas entry routes."

"Quite a lot is at stake in terms of the reputation of British higher education," said John Stoddart, chairman of the HEQC.