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Hosting a record number of reports, the new Database of External Quality Assurance Results (DEQAR) allows scholars, researchers, students, higher education institutions, quality assurance agencies and policy makers to access over 40.000 reports on the quality assurance of higher education institutions.

A record number of reports were uploaded to DEQAR (the Database of External Quality Assurance Results) within the last months, a project co-promoted by Education International with other stakeholders from the academic world and quality assurance agencies. Both France and Germany significantly contributed with reports, thereby adding up the total number of external quality assurance reports in the system to over 40.000. DEQAR now has reports from 32 agencies, covering over 2000 institutions in 39 European Higher Education Area (EHEA) countries. At the moment, DEQAR covers more than 50% of the institutions in 15 EHEA countries.

The database will help students, academics and national authorities primarily when it comes to finding information on recognition and mobility networks. One of the key strengths of the system is that the information can easily be consulted in a user-friendly way and in one place.

A new and improved user interface A new-and-improved DEQAR public user interface was unveiled earlier this month. DEQAR now offers a range of drill-down filter options by decision, cross border review, status and report language to help users obtain the most accurate results. Advanced users can also now search directly by quality assurance report as well as by institution. The DEQAR explainer video was created to explain and promote the database in an accessible, engaging way. Three short versions of the video have been made additionally to use as push content in social media. They are targeted to the researchers and policy makers, students and Higher Education Institutions, and recognition and admission (or internationalisation) officers of higher education institutions. Although many higher education institutions may not be aware of DEQAR yet, recent presentations during congresses and symposiums have shown a growing interest in the project. In the words of a quality advisor at Rotterdam University “DEQAR is increasingly becoming a one-stop shop for the accreditation related section in the partner screening workflow. All information is presented in the same readable and consistent manner independently from the country of origin. This saves  much time and effort. We encourage more quality assurance agencies to join the database.”