UNESCO-APQN Toolkit: regulating the quality of cross-border education

This toolkit is intended to act as an aid in regulating quality assurance for countries that are involved in providing and receiving cross-border education. The toolkit examines cross-border education generally, highlights regulatory frameworks for receiver and provider countries and gives examples of various country regulatory frameworks.

Particular quality issues and implications for cross-border education include:

• programme quality related to low standards and inadequate teaching resources
• misleading or dishonest information including false claims about the programme and its certification
• financial issues including default on fees, cessation of programmes due to the financial difficulty of providers, or even complete provider collapse
• national interest concerns such as programmes that do not cater well to national, cultural or economic needs.

To address these issues, the toolkit highlights different models of regulatory frameworks and practical steps in setting one up. It also outlines possible pitfalls drawn from the experience of some systems to date.