Quality Assessment Lessons from Australia and New Zealand

This article describes two recent efforts to rank the quality of higher education institutions in Australia and New Zealand. After a brief discussion of goals, methods, and results, the author evaluates each ranking using the following questions: Does this methodological approach achieve its objective? Can other countries use the methodology by extension? What can we learn about a country's higher education system using this approach? The aim is to provide readers with a framework for thinking critically about rankings, and about the role they might play in measuring and influencing higher education quality on a global scale. 1. This article is based on a paper given at the first working group meeting for the project, “Higher Education Ranking Systems and Methodologies: How They Work, What They Do”, organized by the Institute for Higher Education Policy and the UNESCO‐European Centre for Higher Education, Washington D.C., U.S.A., 10–11 December, 2004. The author acknowledges with gratitude the Spencer Fou...