Management and Economics
| Open Access |
DOI: Bridging The Policy-Practice Gap: A Scoping Review Of Quality Indicators For Monitoring Credit-Modular System
Kamola Bakhodirovna Haydarova , Ph.D. Candidate, Center for the Research on Development of Higher Education under the Ministry of Higher Education, Science and Innovation of the Republic of UzbekistanAbstract
Credit-modular education and micro-credentials are reshaping higher education through flexibility, mobility and lifelong learning. Despite extensive international policy development, evidence shows persistent gaps between quality assurance policy prescriptions and institutional implementation. This scoping review synthesizes global evidence on the quality indicators used to monitor credit-modular education and micro-credentials. Using a structure–process–outcome framework, more than hundred sources were analyzed. The findings show a strong alignment in basic structural and process indicators but major divergence in outcome and equity indicators. Data silos, regulatory fragmentation, and limited analytical capacity drive this misalignment. This study proposes a harmonized core indicator model to improve policy coherence, institutional monitoring, and learner transparency.
Keywords
Credit-modular system, quality indicators, micro-credentials
References
ENQA. (2018). Standards and Guidelines for Quality Assurance in the European Higher Education Area (ESG). European Association for Quality Assurance in Higher Education.
ENQA. (2023). Quality assurance of micro-credentials: ESG-aligned principles. European Association for Quality Assurance in Higher Education.
European Commission. (2015). ECTS Users’ Guide 2015. Publications Office of the European Union.
EUA. (2020). Trends 2020: The Changing Higher Education Landscape. European University Association.
OECD. (2019). Measuring the digital transformation: A roadmap for the future. Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development.
OECD. (2021). Micro-credentials for lifelong learning and employability. Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development.
UNESCO. (2022). Guidelines on the development and recognition of micro-credentials. United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization.
Arksey, H., & O’Malley, L. (2005). Scoping studies: Towards a methodological framework. International Journal of Social Research Methodology, 8(1), 19–32.
Donabedian, A. (1988). The quality of care. How can it be assessed? Journal of the American Medical Association, 260(12), 1743–1748.
Kehm, B. M., Huisman, J., & Stensaker, B. (2018). The impact of the Bologna Process on European higher education. Springer.
Levac, D., Colquhoun, H., & O’Brien, K. K. (2010). Scoping studies: Advancing the methodology. Implementation Science, 5(1), 1–9.
Tricco, A. C., Lillie, E., Zarin, W., O’Brien, K. K., Colquhoun, H., Levac, D., ... & Straus, S. E. (2018). PRISMA extension for scoping reviews (PRISMA-ScR): Checklist and explanation. Annals of Internal Medicine, 169(7), 467–473.
Wheelahan, L., & Moodie, G. (2021). Analysing micro-credentials in higher education. Journal of Higher Education Policy and Management, 43(3), 1–15.
Buse, K., Mays, N., & Walt, G. (2012). Making health policy (2nd ed.). McGraw-Hill/Open University Press.
Article Statistics
Copyright License
Copyright (c) 2025 Kamola Bakhodirovna Haydarova
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Authors retain the copyright of their manuscripts, and all Open Access articles are disseminated under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License 4.0 (CC-BY), which licenses unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided that the original work is appropriately cited. The use of general descriptive names, trade names, trademarks, and so forth in this publication, even if not specifically identified, does not imply that these names are not protected by the relevant laws and regulations.