Karlstad Business School is working with quality assurance to reach the accreditation according to AACSB. During two days, mentor Ian Clark visited to coach the Business school ahead in the process. It was an opportunity to ask questions, try out lay-outs and make adjustments ahead of the continuous journey.
Three years ago, Karlstad Business School was granted application to start the process for accreditation at AACSB. It was the start of quality assurance work for the entire department. The first analysis which was an extensive self-evaluation according to 15 standards, was sent in last summer. The positive response that the Business School was approved to move ahead in process came in the fall.
But what importance does accreditation have? Professor Ian Clarke from the University of Edinburgh, is appointed the mentor for the Business School. He has previously successfully lead the Business School in Edinburgh and the Business School of the University of Lancaster to achieve accreditation for both AACSB and EQUIS.
- The work with AACSB – accreditation is less about the aim itself, the actual quality stamp, but is more of a systematical quality assurance work to reach the aim that the Business School sets up for themselves, says Ian Clarke.
One of the processes that is in focus this spring is to work with “Assurance of Learning”. The programme leaders and course responsible works with defining what abilities that are to be followed up in a measurement for the upcoming years. Students and employers give input along the way.
- We have had good discussions and received valuable response from our mentor during these two days. The impression is that we have a few challenges for example when it comes to the measurement of learning outcome, but are keeping up with the process. We are working parallelly with all standards and are updating our self-evaluation report which we will send in before summer, says Marie-Theresé Christiansson, responsible for the quality assurance work and the deputy head at the Business School at Karlstad University.
During the visit Ian Clarke also received information regarding the work of the Business School with PRME, Principles for Responsible Management Education.
So far in Sweden, the Jönköping International Business School, the Business School at Gothenburg University as well as the Business School at Umeå University have received accreditation according to AACSB standards.
