ANALYSIS: HIGHER EDUCATION REFORM UNDER SCRUTINY

One of the main social subsystems is education. When it comes to reforms in education, in our country, the emphasis is most often placed on higher education. Recently, a new Law on Higher Education was proposed in the Republic of North Macedonia.

By Riste Kostovski

First of all, before I delve into an analysis of its key points, as someone whose field of interest is public policy, in order to solve a specific problem in a given social segment, that problem must first be defined. With regard to higher education, from what is heard in the public discourse, the problem is the quality of higher education.

In order to move into defining a public policy, program, strategy or law, we should first attempt to define the quality of higher education. In that regard, in my view, quality in higher education should be understood as the quality of teaching at faculties, the availability of literature, the applicability of the knowledge acquired at university, the quality of practical exercises, and so on. In this direction, directly correlated with the quality of higher education are the quality of student accommodation, infrastructure, the level of digitalization in administrative procedures, and so forth.

For these aspects or indicators — which together would form a composite indicator of the quality of higher education — to improve, an analysis of financial capacities and resources is first required. At the same time, in this part, a distinction needs to be made between scientific research and education. Scientific research is part of education, but not everywhere and not always is it emphasized with the same weight. For this reason, a different approach is needed in the work of institutes and faculties. In essence, faculties should naturally focus more on the teaching process, while institutes on research. Therefore, the linear or uniform regulation of scientific publications based on impact factor and the number of published papers — both at faculties and institutes, especially across all sciences — is flawed.

The publication of a scientific paper and the duration of the process differ across sectors, and therefore, I do not consider it appropriate for the focus to be placed solely on this parameter.

Furthermore, reading the Draft Law on Higher Education, the provision that the criteria should not apply retroactively creates negative expectations among those currently in the education process or assistants who aim to build an academic career. I emphasize this because building trust and shaping perceptions of quality, transparency, and the absence of nepotism in higher education are directly correlated with the concept of quality.

For greater trust and reforms aimed at improving the quality of higher education, I believe a decentralized approach is needed — that is, criteria should to some extent be set internally by educational institutions, since this field is highly heterogeneous. It is truly difficult for a single article or law to improve quality or, as it is said in economics, performance and output at the micro level across all disciplines.

When we speak about quality in higher education and the publication of papers, expenditures on research and development allocated from the budget must also be taken into account.

Source: World Bank

If we look at this chart, it is evident that financial allocations for research and development throughout the entire period from 1997 to 2023 (the period for which data are available in the World Bank database) are low.

An even more important dimension of the model of quality in higher education is the efficiency of these expenditures. Efficiency improves with the strengthening of faculty technical capacities and the modernization of laboratories, analytical tools, and related equipment.

The text was developed within the project “Advocacy for Inclusive Development,” financially supported by the Government of Switzerland through the Civica Mobilitas programme.

The content of this text is the sole responsibility of the Forum for Reasonable Policies, IOHN, and BIRC, and in no way can be considered to reflect the views of the Government of Switzerland, Civica Mobilitas, or the implementing organisations.