Ever since the AAU took a shape of modern academic institute, the formation of the Office for Academic Standards and Quality Enhancement in 2012 (staffed with experts in educational management and information system and quality management) was a breakthrough as the University aspires to be one of the top-tier graduate and research universities in Africa and as enhancing the quality of its programs is an indispensible task along with running various programs of studies. The Office is mandated by the University Senate, the highest University ruling body, to translate into action the quality enhancement policy the University developed and expedite all forms of efforts to improve educational quality in the University.

Vision

The OASQE vision and mission are consistent with the mission and vision of the Addis Ababa University and emanate from the AAU’s Quality framework policy.

OASQE, Addis Ababa University, aspires to be one of the ten top-tier academic standards and quality enhancement offices in higher education in Africa in the coming few years leading the Addis Ababa University to commit itself to world-class benchmarks on higher education.

Mission

• Developing and progressively improving a holistic higher education quality policy framework for the University and ensuring that the same is properly implemented on the ground.
• Guiding, assisting and coordinating university-wide efforts to improve student learning via setting benchmarks of excellence/standards, developing quality audit plans, and quality management and enhancement documents.
• Developing a system and a capacity for AAU where evaluation of AAU-stakeholders partnership is conducted; evaluation of AAU graduates’ labor market is done;   evaluation of AAU’s continuing education programs is made, and an evaluation of AAU’s students learning achievement against national standards’ for learning achievement and international achievement tests is carried out; and an evaluation of AAU’s outreach and community services is made.
• Digitalizing faculty and student evaluation /making them on-line/, data collection instruments/ on-line data collection/ instead of manual one/.
• Creating a monitoring mechanism wherein follow up can be done as to the proper implementation of all academic programs, research projects and community services, University-related rules and regulations from the University senate legislation down to specific department based rules, guidelines and regulations, adopting a viable educational quality management system.
• Enhancing institutional effectiveness and educational statistics in the way of assuring and enhancing academic quality and standards.
• Develop guidelines, instruments and measures  of internal systems of quality enhancement;
• Developing quality standards and instruments informed by national and international quality norms to undertake academic audit on periodic basis.
• Leading and monitoring the development of strategies, policies and procedures, directing quality assurance and enhancement.
• Planning and leading academic programs development, approval and review processes; self-evaluation and ensuring that peer reviews of programs and academic units are conducted towards meeting acceptable standards of education.
• Coordinating and facilitating the academic review of teaching, learning, research and service.
• Enabling education duties to carry out their core activities effectively & efficiently
• Support colleges, departments and centers on enhancement of quality of education
• Coordinating and following up the international accreditation of programs of the university when necessary.
• Launching national and internationally partnerships with counterpart institutions so that it can best cater for the quality needs of the university and the public at large by learning from the experiences of other institutions.
• Promoting advocacy on higher education quality assurance using social media and traditional social community structures and indigenous systems.

Goals

Consistent with the AAU’s strategic plan, the OASQE will:

• Organize consultative workshops, conferences and regular forums of research and discussion on timely higher education quality issues.
• Revise regularly following developments in the field of quality assurance and consolidate its organizational structure and develop and revise its strategic plan so that the Office can fully and effectively address all educational quality issues of Addis Ababa University.
• Develop academic standards/benchmarks at the university level regarding, class size, teacher student ratio, lab set ups, qualification of faculty for teaching in the various programs, modularization, continues assessment, continuous professional development (CPD), graduate thesis supervision and examination, reputability of research journals, student academic codes of conduct, administration of authenticity tests (non-plagiarism tests),   program design, approval and review, university level accreditation, instructional diversity management, affirmative action, etc.
• Develop educational management information data bases, generate timely faculty and students related statistics, enrollment profiles, graduation and attrition profiles, and financial and resource utilization and management reports, revenue and expenditure sources, quality plans, quality audit instruments, quality assessment and evaluation questionnaires, manuals and guidelines, etc.
• Publish and disseminate reviews, reports, annual abstracts, program reviews, outcomes of researches on educational quality sponsored by the Office, and proceedings related to the above activities via physical means and electronic media such as webpage, and gather feedback and review feedback for further consumption.
• Forge working partnership with educational quality assurance offices nationally and internationally.
• Scale up the capacity of the Office by improving both the quantity and the quality of skilled workforce needed for fully running the missions of the Office through local and international training networks and educational programs.
• Equip the Office with state-of-the art IT logistics and communication infrastructure and networking facilities with partner institutions and organizations so that the Office can run its duties timely and abreast of time.
• Carry out surveys to measure the degree of AAU’s academic competitiveness with national and international universities and find out public attitude to AAU’s educational quality.
• Monitoring the development of and setting the standards of exit examinations for graduates from the various academic units of the university.
• Monitor the development of and set the standards of graduate entrance examinations for applicants into the various academic units of the University.
• Conduct tracer studies and labor market surveys to collect feed back on the quality of AAU’s graduates and take necessary interventions as might be needed.
• Developing protocols for ensuring the quality of educational workshops and conferences the Addis Ababa University and the various academic units under it organize.

Core values

• Academic freedom
• Excellence
• Integrity and honesty
• Diversity
• Justice and fairness
• Evidence and scientific reasoning
• Dedication to quality

Structure

The ASQEO currently operates under the Academic Vice President of the University with all-round support from the University’s President and all Offices, Colleges, Research Institutes, and Centers. It has two program units: the educational management information system unit and the quality management or enhancement unit.

The Educational Management Information System Unit (EMIS)

The EMIS deals with “a system for organizing information base in a systematic way for the management of educational development’ It is under this unit that educational information is collected, processed, analyzed, published, distributed and feedback is collected on the same for further use.

Quality Management and Enhancement Unit (QMEU)

This unit deals with the overall monitoring and evaluation of the proper implementation of AAU’s academic and non-academic rules and regulations, guidelines, procedures, codes of conduct, academic calendar, guidelines, directives, instructions, and the use of resources such as financial and physical such as academic infrastructures including resources with an intention that failure to implement these rules would jeopardize the overall educational quality in terms of teaching, research and consultancy services in Addis Ababa University.

The ASQEO works very closely with the various offices of AAU to secure up-to-date statistical information on AAU’s programs, faculty, students, and support staff.

Tasks ahead of the Office for Academic Standards and Quality Enhancement

After getting commented by the relevant experts and academic units and getting them approved by the University legislative organs, the Office will publish sets of handbooks containing quality audit instruments, guidelines, and standards and disseminate the same to both the university community and the public and follow up implementation and collect feedbacks as well on them for further improvement. To create an excellent working relationship with offices and partners outside the university, the Office will undertake self-promotional works such as sponsorships, free services, and advertisements.

The Office is committed to develop standards for performance, teaching learning, research and consultancy services, and good governance paying due attention to the context of the Addis Ababa University on one side and national and international experiences on the other side. To this effect, it will stage series of national and international workshops and conferences on academic quality issues from which it will secure inputs for developing its standards. It will design an organizational quality management structure that will enable it to get all the university community involved in quality matters and forward comments and useful expertise in various areas of studies and services.

The Office will also run series of regular quarterly seminars on the various higher education quality issues in consultation and in close collaboration with academic units and colleges in order to heighten the overall awareness of the University community on quality matters and thereby create sustained public mobilization on academic quality matters and introducing quality tracking systems. Finally, the office will soon run series of customer satisfaction surveys at the university level in order to know the level of satisfaction of faculty, students and staff, and key stakeholders with the academic programs, services, facilities, provisions and leadership of the University. It will publish information posters and sheets regarding the AAU’s status and performance.

The Office will continue to forge partnerships with local and international partners, government bodies, and non-government organizations and regulatory bodies in order to mediate its standards, share experience with and further build on the educational quality of the University.