Does the Development of Mass Education Necessarily Mean the End of Quality?

Abstract

Four of Harvey and Green's five definitions of quality are used as an analytical framework to examine whether the massification of higher education is bringing about the end of quality. Recent small-scale research with a sample of senior managers in higher education institutions in the UK revealed that fitness for purpose and transformation were the two most appropriate definitions of quality. Problems of measuring quality as transformation have led to difficulties in its practical application. However, the gauging of fitness for purpose and fitness of purpose through Quality Assurance Agency (QAA) subject reviews indicates that the quality of mass higher education, as measured in these terms, is not at an end.