Is Austria’s second-oldest (since 1585) and second-largest (over 30,000 students) university in its second largest city of Graz (260,000 inhabitants) offering almost all important curricula in its six faculties. The latest innovation of this public generalist university is the interdisciplinary, intercultural, interparadigmatic and interfaculty Master’s curriculum “Global Studies”,,” operating since 2010.
Published in Chapter:
Quality Assurance in Transnational Education Management: The Developmental “Global Studies” Curriculum
Gilbert Ahamer (Austrian Academy of Sciences, Austria)
Copyright: © 2014
|Pages: 44
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-4666-4458-8.ch015
Abstract
This chapter deals with quality assessment for interdisciplinary university curricula. As a case study, it analyses the recently established “Global Studies” (GS) developmental curriculum at Graz University, Austria. After reviewing literature on concepts of quality for curricula, key concepts for multi-disciplinarity, inter-disciplinarity, and trans-disciplinarity, approaches for their monitoring, and necessary ingredients for multi-paradigmatic inputs, processes, and outputs, this chapter applies these criteria to the ethically and globalization-oriented curriculum Global Studies at Graz University, Austria. A practical set of criteria assessing quality in curricula and in courses is identified, a list of assessment exercises that have been performed so far is provided, and assessment of academic performance and suggestions for future improvements are given. Recommendations focus on the implementation of inter-paradigmatic mutual understanding and include setting up a regular, peer-oriented discourse among all stakeholders and founders of the curriculum and the inclusion of expertise into the curricula commission. All such concrete measures shall underpin the key capability of inter-paradigmatic studies, namely to see complex phenomena as perceived by other stakeholders, friend or foe.