The project aims to increase the capacity of public administration for evidence-based policy making in the field of higher education, while focusing on good practices at international level and impact assessment.

The project will put forward a new philosophy of data collection and interpretation for the Romanian higher education. The specialists involved in the project will first identify the specific data types required to substantiate public policies and then elaborate the methodologies for data collection. Another element of novelty is the design of an online platform with relevant data gathered from the Romanian universities, structured on the basis of well-defined indicators. Once put into place, this platform will constitute an important resource for public policies formulation. All the envisaged outcomes of the project are components of a large scale effort designed to develop the Strategic Information System for Higher Education.

With the contribution of the national and international experts, the project will also generate a number ofstudies on the existing higher education public policies and internal quality management systems, in terms of performance and fitness for purpose. The methodological framework for a multi-dimensional classification of higher education programmes will be developed within the project. Additionally, the experts will seek ways for a successful Romanian implementation of the U-Map project, which envisages multi-dimensional university rankings, as well as their influence on higher education funding. All these deliverables, together with Bologna Process related information, will be made available to the public on a dynamic WEB 2.0. platform.

Furthermore, the project aims to identify a group of resource persons involved in the higher education policy making process. In order to achieve this objective, the national and international expertize in elaboration, monitoring and evaluation of public policies will serve as a starting point. Training sessions on the data collection and statistical interpretation will be organized, thus ensuring the quality of the data collected and their optimum use throughout the decision making process, at strategic and operational level.

The public will be provided access to structured information, various national and international documents by means of an online library on higher education public policies, also developed within the project. This deliverable represents follow-up on the Romanian initiative to create a Bologna Process online database, as part of the Bologna Secretariat responsibilities (2010 – 2012).

A semantic analysis of public policies documents, promotion of equity and sustainable developmentconstitute other envisaged deliverables of the “Higher Education Evidence Based Policy Making: a necessary premise for progress in Romania” project.

The Higher Education Evidence Based Policy Making: a necessary premise for progress in Romania project aims to increase the capacity of public administration for evidence-based policy making, thus leading to a more efficient and modern the higher education system. The main instrument to achieve this goal is the efficient implementation, monitoring and evaluation of governmental intervention, with beneficial impact on public policies formulation in the field of higher education. This will contribute to the successful implementation of objective DMI1.2, Increasing the public administration awareness and responsibility.

Specific objectives

Raising awareness and increasing the efficiency of governmental intervention in the formulation, monitoring and evaluation of higher education public policies will be achieved by fulfillment of the following specific objectives (SO):

SO1: Designing an online knowledge platform which would enable post-implementation development and dynamic exploitation of the project results;

SO2: Developing individual and institutional competences for quantitative and qualitative data collection on the higher education status-quo, by means of elaborating specific methodologies and training of the personnel involved in the data collection and reporting processes;

SO3: Developing the individual and institutional capacity for public policies formulation through training sessions for the pool of resource persons, pilot exercises and guides;

SO4: Conducting a pilot exercise for study programmes classification in the Romanian higher education institutions;

SO5: Increasing the institutional and inter-institutional capacity to substantiate evidence-based public policies at higher education level, by means of statistical analyses;

SO6: Disseminating the project systemic analyses to both the wide public and the international community for information, debate and feedback purposes.

The most notable deliverables envisaged by the Higher Education Evidence Based Policy Making: a necessary premise for progress in Romania project are:

• A pool of resource persons with experience in elaboration of higher education public policies and the adequate framework for their efficient performance;
• Harmonized systems for data collection, elaboration and monitoring of indicators used for underpinning public policies;
• Specific data types to substantiate public policies on the implementation of the Bologna Process action lines, study programmes classifications and university rankings;
• Specific data collection methodologies for implementing the Bologna Process action lines, study programmes classifications and university rankings;
• An online platform with the data collected for the elaboration of higher education public policies;
• A WEB 2.0 online platform with relevant information on the Romanian higher education;
• Case studies on the elaboration of public policies;
• A set of IT instruments and the specific methodology designed for the semantic analysis of the public policies documents;
• Semantic analysis reports on the public policies documents;
• An ex-ante impact assessment of higher education programs classification;
• An analysis of the current public policies at higher education level;
• A methodology /funding model of the Romanian higher education, according to the National Education Law;
• An analysis of the performance and fitness for purpose of the internal quality assurance systems in the Romanian universities;
• A multi-dimensional analysis of Romanian higher education institutions;
• Promotion of higher education equity and sustainable development.

The project results will be used by the Romanian Ministry of Education, Research, Youth and Sport, UEFISCDI and the public institutions with higher education responsibilities to improve the institutional framework facilitating the elaboration of national public policies and also to underpin Romania’s commitments at European and international level.

Luciana BRATU
Procurement Coordinator

Elena Gica
HR Coordinator

Cosmin Cioranu
Coordinating applications

Adrian CURAJ
Project Manager