The Board of the European Association for Quality Assurance in Higher Education (ENQA), at its meeting on 28th April 2020, decided to grant the National Entity for Accreditation and Quality Assurance in Higher Education (NEAQA) affiliate status with ENQA.
Previous Commission for Accreditation and Quality Assurance (“old” CAQA) has become a full ENQA member in April 2013. CAQA has done self-evaluation report in 2012 and 2017 which was the basis for its external evaluation performed by ENQA. In February 2018 ENQA did not renew CAQA’s full membership status and designated its position as “Member under review” for a period of two years. At almost the same time, instead of CAQA, the new National Entity for Accreditation and Quality Assurance in Higher Education (NEAQA) was established by the Decision of the Government of the Republic of Serbia as a national independent body in institutional, financial, administrative and professional matters in accordance with the Law on Higher Education of 2017. NEAQA was enlisted in the state register on 9th March 2018 and its Steering Committee was constituted on 3rd May 2018. On the basis of a public competition the NEAQA’s Director was elected on 19th July 2018, as well as the members of the Commission for Accreditation and Quality Assurance (“new” CAQA), which was constituted on 30th August 2018 as an expert body of NEAQA. As CAQA’s universal legal successor, NEAQA kept in ENQA the same status “member under review”, until February 2020.
In the coming period NEAQA’s main goal is to comply with European Standards and Guidelines (ESG) according to ENQA’s remarks, particularly through the strengthening of the independence from the Ministry and the role of the external experts including students’ and labour market representatives, involving foreign experts in the evaluation processes, performing site-visits, etc.
Its main goal is to achieve full membership in ENQA and registration on EQAR in next two years, to attain more complete internationalization and take adequate place in the European higher education area.