Higher education institutions worldwide invest significant resources in their quality assurance systems however little empirical research exists which demonstrates their effectiveness (or otherwise). Methodological approaches for determining effectiveness are also underdeveloped. Self study with peer review is a widely used model for ensuring the quality of the core teaching, research and engagement activities of higher education institutions. This paper illustrates how an established social programme evaluation methodology can be used to determine its effectiveness in leading to improvements in institutional performance. The concept of effectiveness and the particular challenges posed by the higher education organisational culture are considered. An example of the systematic evaluation of three self study programmes is provided to illustrate the concept. It is concluded that social programme evaluation has significant potential in evaluating the effectiveness of quality assurance initiatives in higher education. KeywordsEvaluation of effectiveness, social programme evaluation, quality assurance, higher education, self study with peer review Quality Assurance in Higher EducationNational quality assurance agencies, almost unheard of 20 years ago, are now in place in almost all OECD countries (OECD 2003). Stensaker notes that while there are a growing number of studies on quality assurance, there is a lack of research on the impact of quality assurance at institutional level (Stensaker 2007). He cites the methodological issues surrounding the assessment of the impact of quality assurance processes as a major challenge (Stensaker 2007). Harvey and Newton note that establishing definitive causal links and isolating their effects from other factors is a difficult task (Harvey and Newton 2004). Birnbaum states that there are "few published examples in the academic sector of attempts to assess the institutional consequences of a management fad through data that provide evidence either of organizational outcomes or of the satisfaction of users" (Birnbaum 2000). Evidence of the effectiveness of the core activities of higher education (teaching, research and engagement) is generally increasing however (Pascarella & Terenzini 2005). It is important to note that this paper does not focus on the effectiveness of these core activities, rather the effectiveness (or otherwise) of the quality assurance instruments we use to assess them. These instruments are in widespread use by governments, higher education quality assurance agencies and internally within institutions. The question being addressed is to what extent we can trust these instruments. Van Vught and Westerheijden found that the predominant model for quality improvement includes regular self-evaluations with external peer review by the higher Page 2 of 15 education institute (Van Vught and Westerheijden 1995). Self study with peer review is often cited as being most suited to the "professional bureaucracy" type of organisation (Mintzberg 1983) as it gives ow...

Strategic planning has become an integral part of the management of higher education interviews with senior managers with responsibility for strategic planning. The paper considers whether the strategic planning models used in the past decade will be able to meet the challenges presented by unprecedented economic circumstances and the new national strategy for higher education in Ireland. Significant deficits are identified with respect to strategic planning for institutional diversity, performance-related funding and external stakeholder engagement.Fundamental questions are raised in relation to the approaches taken to strategy development.

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In this paper, we will introduce to describe learning resources by using ontology model based on metadata of learning standard as Sharable Content Object Reference Model (SCORM) and Dublin Core metadata. Then we will present how to research and discover them with query language as SPARQL query language. The designing of metadata structure has followed the standard metadata and we have added some categories and elements to managing the indexation and classification. To find resources in our ontology we will show some examples of retrieving them by using SPARQL query language. For our study we have proved them by using an ontology tool as Protégé package.