Restricted Area

Message from the President

Welcome to the official site of the Asia-Pacific Quality Network (APQN)!

APQN is a young network but one that has been nurtured by stalwarts in quality assurance such as Dr David Woodhouse, Mr Peter Cheung and Prof VS Prasad who formed its first/founding team of office bearers. It started as a group of quality assurance agencies in the Asia-Pacific region that expressed an interest to share information and expertise in areas of mutual interest, during the 2001 INQAAHE conference held in India in 2001. The group met in Hong Kong in January 2003, took up its official name and formed a Steering Committee to coordinate its activities, mostly projects that address the quality assurance needs of the region.

In December 2004, APQN was incorporated as a legal entity within the State of Victoria in Australia and the Secretariat was hosted by the Australian Universities Quality Agency till February 2009. In March 2009, the administration of this non-profit organization moved to the Shanghai Education Evaluation Institute, China.

During the last eight years, with the support of the APQN Board and enthusiastic members, the network has grown from strength to strength. Today, with 80 members from 33 countries and territories in the region, APQN has positioned itself as a leader in quality assurance in the Asia-Pacific region.

APQN aims to enhance the quality of higher education in Asia and the Pacific region through building the capacity of quality assurance agencies and extending the cooperation between them. We do this by promoting good practice, facilitating research, providing advice, information and expertise, and developing links between quality assurance agencies. Our vision is to be the first point of reference for advice or support, one that is efficient in operation and open in information sharing.

APQN relies heavily on the voluntary work of its members and the intellectual capital the members bring to the activities. The role APQN can play in capacity development in quality assurance has been recognised by world bodies such as the UNESCO and the World Bank. APQN was the first network to receive the World Bank Development Grant Fund (DGF) from September 2004 to March 31, 2008. For the past two years (2009 and 2010) it has also been a beneficiary of the Global Initiative for Quality Assurance Capacity (GIQAC) grant administered by UNESCO and the GIQAC support has extended to this year as well. Projects that have been successfully implemented with the GIQAC grant include online discussion forums, creation of a database of consultants, developing training material for trainers in quality assurance and the internship programs. There have been over 50 staff exchanges and internships that benefitted more than 20 countries across the region. The moderated online forums have involved over 200 people from 40 of our member agencies.

An Evaluation Review of the DGF projects conducted by an independent external consultant in May 2008 showed that 'the greatest impact has occurred in improving QA mechanisms across national systems in various countries, in the exchange of ideas and of expertise, and in promoting communication and cooperation between agencies and institutions'. The review conducted in 2010 of the GIQAC projects of APQN acknowledged APQN's leadership role in initiating projects which are then adopted by the other networks.

I look forward to using this website a platform to discuss the targets for the 2011-13 Board and strategies to achieve them with the support of the APQN community!

Best wishes to all

Dr Antony Stella

President, APQN

Audit Director, Australian Universities Quality Agency