Croatia

Agency for Science and Higher Education (ASHE)

Contact Information

Street name:  Donje Svetice 38/5
Postal code and City:  10 000 Zagreb
Country: Croatia
Phone/Fax: +385 1 6274 800/+385 1 6274 801
E-mail: medju@azvo.hr
Website: www.azvo.hr
Presentations:
AZVO
Developments and progress 05/2023
Contact person: Emita Blagdan
Function of contact person: Assistant Director
Founding year: 2005
Legal status:
Publicly funded and non-profit institution
International Links and membershi: listed in EQAR; full member of ENQA, ECA, INQAAHE, CHEA International Group, OECD IMHE, ENIC/NARIC network, IREG Observatory on Academic Ranking and Excellence, IAAO (International Association of Admissions Organisations), the International Association of GUIDE Association; observer in APQN

The Croatian Agency for Science and Higher Education was established by the Croatian Government as an independent, publicly funded and non-profit institution tasked with assuring and improving the Croatian system of higher education and science and, specifically, implementing external quality assurance procedures at all Croatian higher education and scientific institutions, public and private. With its activities, ASHE contributes to strengthening of QA activities at national level and promoting European co-operation in quality assurance.

ASHE currently has 73 employees. ASHE bodies are the Management Board, the Director, and the Accreditation Council, an expert body that adopts external QA procedures and issues final opinions on the quality of higher education institutions and scientific organisations. ASHE consists of 5 directorates: Directorate for Higher Education, Directorate for Science, Directorate for International Cooperation, Central Application Office and General Administration and Internal QA Office.

The Agency for Science and Higher Education performs a number of procedures that are mandatory for higher education and scientific institutions operating in Croatia: initial accreditation of HEIs, programmes and scientific organisations, re-accreditation of HEIs and scientific organisations, and quality audit of institutional quality assurance systems. The accreditation and re-accreditation procedures are based on national and ESG standards and quality criteria, and result in a decision to establish or continue and improve the higher education and/or scientific activity (ASHE started the second cycle of re-accreditation in 2017, in line with ESG 2015). The audit procedure can result in a certificate for HEIs’ QA systems. In addition, the Agency conducts thematic reviews and various other activities (admission to higher education institutions, tracking graduate students’ employability and career development, recognition of foreign qualifications, facilitating internationalisation, process of appointment into scientific/teaching grades, dissemination of information on QA system, HE system and scientific organisations in Croatia, etc).