Higher education quality assurance: the case of the United States

The purpose of this article is to provide an overview and critique of higher education quality assurance in the context of the United States (US), reviewing the US model in terms of its history, characteristics, problems and controversies, in an effort to extract lessons that are applicable to other countries, including Brazil. The study examines topics such as institutional rankings, student learning assessment, the role of government in the university accreditation process and the challenge of assuring the quality of for-profit institutions. The article concludes with a list of recommendations extracted from the US experience that could conceivably contribute to the improvement of quality assurance frameworks in other parts of the world.