Modernization of Educational Programmes: A Useful Tool for Quality Assurance

Globalization has led to increase competition between universities; consequently, current higher education bodies have to fight for their stable educational position on educational market, as well as at labour arena. It is worth to note, that quality education plays a crucial role in preserving the position of universities at domestic and international markets. At the same time, it is significantly important to consider requirements of major stakeholders (employers, students and parents) in developing content of educational programmes. The challenges of information and technology age have triggered complete modernization of university's educational programs. In this regard, without a doubt, in our opinion diversification of study programmes taking into account the demand of labour market, as well as needs of potential consumers and recommendations of accreditation bodies is a key area of quality assurance. In this article, we attempt to observe how the process of modernization of study programmes for quality guarantee has been taking place at al-Farabi Kazakh National University and make general analysis of update in degree programmes from the perspectives of accreditation agencies' reports. According to reports of accreditation agencies, the significant number of educational programmes of al-Farabi Kazakh National University has been awarded an European quality seal, which symbolizes the growth of international recognition of educational programmes of the university. In the meantime, on the base of our observation, this innovative approach is carried out in accordance with the state programmes for modern innovative development of society and current trends in the development of professional education in the world. In other words, this approach enables the university to prepare competitive graduates with knowledge, skills and professional competencies in accordance with 6-8 levels of the European Qualification Framework.