Message from the President

achieved global accreditation from the Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education (QAA), UK

I am delighted to announce that our University has achieved global accreditation from the Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education (QAA), the UK’s independent quality body and a global leader in quality assurance for higher education. The global accreditation is awarded to international institutions who have passed the QAA’s rigorous International Quality Review (IQR), which measures global institutions against international quality assurance standards set out in Part 1 of the Standards and Guidelines for Quality Assurance in the European Higher Education Area (ESG).

The review took place between 24-26 January 2022 by a team of three independent reviewers including a UK, International, and student reviewer. In making their conclusions, the review team confirmed that the University meets all 10 of the internal quality assurance standards in the ESG. The following is an extract from the QAA’s conclusions about Applied Science University: the QAA review team reached the following conclusions about the higher education provision at Applied Science University highlighting that the University meets all of the 10 ESG Standards and Guidelines and they have identified the following features of good practice at Applied Science University.

• ASU has partnered with the UK’s professional body AdvanceHE to offer a fellowship scheme for its academic staff to recognise excellence in teaching and learning and student support. High proportion of academic staff have achieved certifications at different levels of the fellowships. (ESG Standard 1.5)

• The university’s IT systems integrates databases and other sources of information allowing accessibility of data and the embedding of management information into decision-making processes at all levels of the institution. (ESG Standard 1.7).

IQR uses the 10 European standards (ESGs) which are:

1. Policy for quality assurance
2. Design and approval of programmes
3. Student-centred learning, teaching and assessment
4. Student admission, progression, recognition and certification
5. Teaching staff
6. Learning resources and student support
7. Information management
8. Public information
9. Ongoing monitoring and periodic review of programmes
10. Cyclical external quality assurance

Professor Waheeb Al-Khaja, Chairman of the Board of Trustees said: ‘we are delighted with this achievement as of we have always been committed to a culture of excellence in teaching and learning, research and community engagement’. Professor Ghassan Aouad, President of the University, said: ‘this achievement reflects the international reputation of the Univetsity as we have always been committed to achieving an international recognition of our University. This is the result of a team effort of all the Univetsity’s stakeholders including staff, students, alumni and external collaborators. ASU is the first university in the Kingdom of Bahrain that has achieved the QAA’s global accreditation’.

The University has obtained QAA institutional accreditation for a period of five years, subject to a satisfactory mid-cycle review. This allows us to display QAA’s IQR Accreditation Badge, which demonstrates that our quality assurance procedures are comparable with international best practice.

Many congratulations to the Chairman of the Board of Directors, Mr Sameer Nass, the Chairman of the Board of Trustees, Professor Waheeb Al-Khaja, and to all of you.

Well done ASU as you are going from strength to strength and will always stay as a beacon of knowledge, innovation, and teaching and research advancement.