Invited by Prof. Dr. Ivanka Popovic, rector of the University of Belgrade and president of the Conference of the Universities of Serbia – CONUS, representatives of the National Body for Accreditation and Quality Assurance in Higher Education of Serbia – NEAQA, Prof. Dr. Sima Avramovic, president of the Management Board, and Prof. Dr. Jelena Kočović, director of the NEAQA, participated at the sixth session of the Rectors Council of the Conference of the Universities of Serbia, which was held on September 17th, 2019 at the Faculty of Philosophy, University of Belgrade. Prof. Avramovic and prof. Kocovic presented the work of the National Accreditation Body and the changes in the system of quality assurance in higher education in Serbia, introduced by the Law on Higher Education from 2017, as well as by new regulations on accreditation, external quality control and self-evaluation. It was agreed to intensify cooperation between the two bodies in order to further improve the quality of higher education in Serbia, which includes more frequent meetings of representatives of two bodies and organization of trainings and seminars on quality assurance in higher education.
Prof. Dr. Jelena Kocovic, Director of the NEAQA, and Prof. Dr Ana Sijacki, president of Commission for Accreditation and Quality Assurance (CAQA) of the NEAQA, addressed to the delegates at the second session of the Assembly of the Conference of the Universities of Serbia, which was held on September 17th, 2019 at the Faculty of Philology, University of Belgrade. Prof. Kocovic and prof. Sijacki informed the universities’ representatives about the results of the National Accreditation Body’s work and about changes in the system of quality assurance in higher education in Serbia, adopted by the new Law on Higher Education and new by-laws in the field of accreditation and quality assurance in higher education. After the introductory remarks by prof. Kocovic and prof. Sijacki, prof. dr. Ivana Stojanovic, member of the CAQA, presented the novelties in the processes of external quality assurance with reference to the protocol of peer-reviews panels’ visits to higher education institutions, standards for external quality assurance and self-evaluation of higher education institutions and study programmes and the form of the reviews’ reports on external quality assurance to HEI. Prof. dr. Branko Perisic, leader of the University of Novi Sad – Faculty of Technical Sciences’ team for development of new software for verifying quantitative data in the accreditation process – NAT2019, and Mr. Branko Pavlovic, responsible for the implementation of NAT2019 software in the NEAQA, presented the new NAT2019 software and provided delegates of the CONUS Assembly with explanations on how to use the software.