The Dutch-Flemish Accreditation Organization (NVAO) is a quality assurance agency that safeguards the quality of higher education in the Netherlands and Flanders region of Belgium, in an expert and independent manner, and that fosters the quality culture pursued within the higher education institutions in the Netherlands and Flanders. NVAO was established in 2005 by Treaty between the Netherlands and Flanders. The responsibilities of NVAO have been set down in the WHW (chapters 5 and 5a).
NVAO accredits bachelor and master degree programmes every six years. NVAO also conducts institutional audits of universities in the Netherlands every six years, to assess their internal system of quality assurance and management. The University of Twente successfully passed the institutional audit in 2020. Programmes offered by institutions that have passed the institutional audit (ITK), can be assessed in accordance with the framework for limited programme assessment.
The assessment of existing programmes involves a site visit carried out by an NVAO-approved panel of independent, expert peers. The programmes must demonstrate that their educational practice meets the standards. The assessment focuses on the quality achieved and addresses the intended learning outcomes, the teaching and learning environment, student assessment, and the achieved learning outcomes.
DEVELOPMENT dialogue
As part of the assessment of an existing programme, a development meeting (development dialogue) also takes place either during, or at a separate time from the site visit. In this meeting, the panel and the programme discuss the most important developments and improvement areas for the programme with a view to the future. The panel ensures that the development meeting provides a safe context in which to discuss challenges and future developments without any conclusion being drawn from this. These recommendations for further development of the programme must be made public by the institution.
reports
Accreditation reports and development reports (where available) can be found below.
The complete report and more information about the accreditation procedure and the register of accredited programmes can be found on the NVAO website.