The role of quality assurance in Saudi higher education institutions

Quality assurance, quality assessment, and world rankings have become competitively and increasingly a global concern and a worldwide pursuit among higher education institutions leading them to review their aims, objectives, academic practices, target students and scholars. This paper provides a comprehensive review and discussion of quality assurance policies and practices (as described in the form of accreditation self-study reports) of four selected Saudi public universities which normally assess their quality through their accreditation pursuit and efforts to catch a seat in global rankings both nationally and internationally. These official reports form the first step in pursuing and evaluating quality assurance. The review of the selected reports in this paper is proceeded by a thematic analysis of interview data with selected academic professors and leaders. Findings indicated that due to the centralization and bureaucracy imposed by the ministry, individual universities' creativity is normally limited and that raise questions regarding the reliability and value of self-study reports mandated by official evaluation entity in the country and submitted by public universities. Moreover, although accreditation, as part of quality assurance in Saudi Arabia frames the quality standard, increases confidence on the programs and enhances public trust on the educational institutions, accreditation is not the whole story.