Topic: Connecting the European Higher Education accreditation framework to the VC ecosystem with Colin Tuck\
Colin_(EQAR): Yes hi everyone thanks thanks Simone for the kind introduction and hi everyone please to to join your meeting today I'm so I'm calling I've been working as the Director of Academia open quality assurance register basically since its founding which is in 2008 and so I've prepared a few slides indeed I'm going to show them why Prezi I hope you.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): you see them more mirrored but the right way.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): Normal is see them in the you see them in the video.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): Well let me yeah let me then quickly put the link right yeah so that's going to take a second I can probably send you a link over the stand.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): I've never used that life crazy before but it's supposed to be possible so let's see.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): Well I give it a few seconds and I'll also send that's the that's the LifeLink LED this chair for reference I just share a link towards work afterwards again without the life one.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): Should be like one should be good for now let me just change my video here done with that wouldn't you stopped or but just presented from here life okay so I'm going to try to sum up in a few words okay what is our starting what is the European higher education quality assurance system because I.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): And of course there will be some people won't hear from you but many will not be and some might be familiar with that and some might not so sorry for those that are already familiar with it if it's going to be any boring but I think it it's just to illustrate what is the starting point for linking this to the fiber credential echo system so in the European higher education area we have a quality assurance.\ ✪
<simone_ravaioli_(vc_edu)> Can everyone follow the slides ?\
<sharon_leu> Works for me.\
Colin_(EQAR): Of standards they are called the ESG or the European standards and guidelines for quality assurance and they have already been agreed since 2005 as a general set of standards for quality assurance at the institutional level at external level in higher education for the whole European higher education area and these statements are then used by national and Regional quality assurance and accreditation by this too.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): Collected editions of higher education institutions and programs in Europe so the nail in addition to the ESG as a set of Standards you have a card or the organization I represent European quality assurance register and we are the official register of quality assurance agencies that have proven their compliance with the agreed set of Standards so we currently have about 50 agencies on the register from a number of you.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): in countries and these agencies were call.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): Common language reference framework so so we have currently the those countries you see in green on the map if you see the slide of course so that's 29 countries in Europe that do work in line with the agreed standards and that are working with agents quality assurance and equitation agencies that I register Tanaka and this part of the common agreed framework then.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): Have had an addition to the register of agencies we have also been maintaining a pan-european database of quality assured higher education institutions and programs so we so we have been working to bring together all the information on accredited higher education institutions and programs by those 50 agencies in one single place in one single European one.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): One Stop Shop to make that easily available.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): For the public and because we thought okay we do have a common framework so we need to have also the information on who has been accredited in line with that agreed framework in one place and in one comparable format especially if there was a specially created for the purposes of furthering recognition and automatic recognition within the European area but I think it's something that comes in very hard for now on trying to link.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): Through the by fiber credentialing system onto digital credentials in more General because as a result of that work on Decca we have a comprehensive data set on accredited higher education institutions and programs in at least 20 23 European countries and that the number keeps growing because they're covering more and more countries by their agencies being registered with us and by the age.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): this is providing us with data on.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): Higher education institutions and programs so since we already have data for so many countries in a standardized format it of course seems quite logical to go through us to to connect those to the very fiber credentials echo system to make sure that quality assurance data can be easily used in in the field of digital credentials I'm going to say a few words about linking.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): Canvas with the European digital credentials for learning initiative which is an EU initiative and that is currently not based on verifiable credentials but as far as we understand that might that might change in the future and that is just to to illustrate briefly that we have also other digital credentials existence where Deca data is already linked to but so is so the European digital credentials initiative is based on.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): In this is if it's based on every country providing a list of accredited education providers so in that case there's basically a poor country export of data from decorated that countries can use to to feed that information into the European digital credentials ecosystem and once they do that it can be used in a standardized way but I'm not going to go into details with that but rather say a few words about linking duck under verifiable credentials are.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): assisting with is as Somalia said being inspired.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): Pepsi or initiative but I do want to underline that is of course not limited to AB c-- for us because in a way AB C AB c-- was the first concrete starting point where we were that made us think about linking DACA to verifiable credentials and expressing data from that caused by fiber credentials but we also soon realize that that is not that that should not be limited to AB c-- and that of course.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): there might be a more generic use case for.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): So in FCS some of you probably know the the general idea is that quality assurance a quotation results itself is also expressed as a very fiber credential in our case the issue of that accreditation cadential would be would be a cow in a way it's we are not as such the issue of the accreditation because we are not accredited education institutions that.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): we are quite a thing we are creditors if you like.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): So in this case we will be acting as a proxy for the accredited agencies to issue by fiber credentials and they would of course be issued to the higher education institution that is accredited with some details in a about the scope or specific program study program or degree that is accredited of course we have I think we have.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): With a quotation credentials you have one ones say one advantage of one aspect that makes some things rather simple for us because all the data all the information we are talking about is public by Nature so privacy is not really an issue at all for an accreditation could ensure so we are our approach to files being to basically offer well.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): Nothing I could have taken for download which could be for public download so the institution concerned or anyone else who needs to rely on it could use it because there's a really nothing private or Secret in there so as a result of as a result of discussions with an absolute with yeah started on the one hand to issue the issue AB c-- compliant ofc a standard aligned the very fiber credentials.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): to use within the apps ecosystem but we have.\ ✪
<deb_everhart_(credential_engine)> this looks like a very logical set of data to publish as linked open data in CTDL-- that would provide the data structure to connect the QA information to the specific credentials issued\
Colin_(EQAR): Empowering than mainly as a proof of concept for now we have also been issuing let's say a generic de Cobo fiber credentials just to just to show how we could easily I should verify the credentials for any accusation of quality assurance and deca so I'm going to say a few words about the implementation how we're doing that for now we're using a software called.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): To to basically do the fiber credential signing and so so we basically integrated that with our existing deck aback and and whenever we need Deco report expressed as a very fiber production which is the SSI cat2222 request and sign that it's a credential I'm done with this as I said eventually presented publicly.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): luckily for download so this is how it would look if.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): Look as a single accreditation record on Decca in this case it's an Institutional a quotation of a university in Spain and here you would see that you could find the very fiber credential that both in the genomic data format which would be available for all institutions and all accreditations we have in this case because it is an institution University that is participating also the ab c-- early adopters you would also find it there.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): are in an under specifically for form.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): Why us so I'm just going to zoom into how the credential looks like that's now a generic decode them show where you would see them the main problem I would say well the main shortcoming we see now with the generic could mshulist that we are not able to issue it to any to any date for the University at the moment so at this moment for proof of.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): Education institution by playing UI which refers to its identifier on Decca and but of course that is not that would not be that would not be very good for ya for production use and the case we do have an institution that participates an AB c-- of course there would be issued to the app see the ID of the institution and well otherwise you would see the details of the accreditation or.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): or were in the credential we also include.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): On the identifiers of the institution that we know of for example from the last month program from other European Registries of higher education institutions Etc and and then of course there this point for generic generic credentials we issue them by the web from our side was the ab c-- credentials would be issued by our data.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): To include the information on the actual accreditation Agency on whose behalf so we are showing that credential understand the actual accreditation now to finish off with open questions and issues we have or I could see of course one main questions how eventually how will we link quality assurance cadential and the qualification credential that is issued under that act rotational I'm not that.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): Quality officer quality assurance in the case of ab c-- days of there is an approach of translation register sewing the case of a Pepsi will work in such a way that the higher education institution takes the very fiber credential that we issued to them and upload that themselves onto the trusted issue register with their with their own apps idiot of course they're the biggest problem for doing anything at scale for.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): Our existing data set to higher education institutions identity in the sense of any kind of did based identity they might use for also later on issuing credentials to students for app see that that works only manually for now so what if we do have an institution that the participates in the axial adopters we would need to go into our into our data set and record their the ab c-- did some worm before before we could.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): tissue an FC Alliance accreditation.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): As I said before for other higher education institutions with do not have any any system in place yet for linking the data we have to do any kind of did the institution might be using we have been thinking that could be a possibility for trying some kind of Auto Discovery or all to matching of the web's because we one of the information that we do have on every higher education Institution.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): Domain and web site so so there will be one possible Avenue for for doing that and of course we might think of there any other ways to reliably and automatically true for link the higher education institutions are density and that car through the two that did of whatever thought so for example we could imagine that if a higher education institution can could produce a wave.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): a fiber presentation that includes.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): Could answer by any kind of authoritative Source the confirms the VLT number or other legal identify that we might know then you might have a possibility to link the identity but we don't really have any clear solution to that problem yet and I think that will be the biggest the biggest challenge for scaling this up because we couldn't obviously work with an approach where we will need to manually link and.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): situations identities and that come with them.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): That Leti in the fiber credentials and data acquisition system and the ladder another open issue that we have is of course we vocation and status of credentials where we haven't implemented anything yet but here we presume that this is not going to be a major issue to do because again unlike the actual student diploma student agree use case we do not have any privacy issue.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): here so it would be the woman oh.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): For example to issue a revocation lists that are completely public because that information which accreditation might be revoked with anyway the public by Nature so so I think they had to sum it up really that the biggest challenge we would have to scaling up the use of DACA issued accreditation credentials would really be to identify a higher education institutions on Match their identity in the very fiber.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): it's a cool system with that existing identity indica.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): Thanks for that and look forward to some questions and discussions with you guys.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): Well of course it's not register of universities act as a way to stop agencies but then because we are already federating that information from those agencies which Institute which universities and programs they they have quieted that's why we do already have a Federated trust issue a list in a way.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): So I think that my main but my problem is that we have we have no direct relation with the individual universities so we do have we do gathered information on universities and which of them have been a quality but we don't have a diary I mean it's not that the institutions have any direct contact or login with us or something of that sort.\ ✪
Jen_Schreiber: Yeah thanks so much for the great presentation was really interesting and relevant from some other working groups that I'm a part of but could you explain a little bit how the accreditation credential is published or how is that made available to the public.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): Well at this moment they are they're quite simply make sure they're made available on our website within the DECA database where you find.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): Imitation information for every accreditation record you would find the corresponding y fiber credential next to it.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): So it's just sort of thrown out there publicly on the web.\ ✪
Jen_Schreiber: Got it but no kind of API endpoint it's all in the gooey.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): I know that it's actually there is an API there's an API endpoint that we use internally at this moment it's not it's not public but it is going to be very soon I mean it's just because we have we've been testing it for the past couple of months and in the very near future that will be an API endpoint where you can basically directly access their by father.\ ✪
<jen_schreiber> thank you!\
Deb_Everhart_(Credential_Engine): Hey everyone so thank you this is this is super interesting not only with regard to our work at credential engine but also because I've been working with and quite hey on their International standards guidelines for Q&A agencies and part of what we surfaced in that work is exactly this type of data the need for trust Registries in terms of.\ ✪
Deb_Everhart_(Credential_Engine): who are the Q&A.\ ✪
Deb_Everhart_(Credential_Engine): Students and how can they serve varying roles and who Q&A is a Q&A organizations right now that's sounds kind of Meta Meta but it's actually super important the the more tactical point I wanted to make here is that this seems like a very logical set of data to use linked open data so the credential.\ ✪
Deb_Everhart_(Credential_Engine): Language actually provides the structure for this where there's a type of organization it's Q&A organization and then that Q&A organization can actually issue I'm sorry can document quality assurance credentials that they provide to the institutions and part of the beauty of it being linked up and data is the data from the institutions and their information about their credentials comes from the institutions.\ ✪
Deb_Everhart_(Credential_Engine): the data from the.\ ✪
Deb_Everhart_(Credential_Engine): Body comes from the Q&A body but it all gets connected via the linked open data and that can be done with see gdl regardless of where the data resides but also this could the data that you have already could be published to our registry for providing those kinds of connections.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): So I think you also posted a link in the chat before we didn't you yeah I think we definitely look into that and I think that will be interesting to see where ya explore different ways where we could publish everything from that is on Deck has linked open data where we have been focusing a lot on the European logic model which of course is also.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): Because that of course is our main let's say out our main focus area so sir but we so I think we were yeah they've been following the development of the European learning model quite a lot and we'll work on publishing the Deka date and that format as well.\ ✪
Deb_Everhart_(Credential_Engine): Yeah everything we can do to get this into linked open data and have data contributors coming to it from multiple angles is very useful thanks.\ ✪
Nate_Otto_(he/him): Cool thanks I'm great presentation I'm always very interested in development that are in this area of understanding like why should we trust this particular product credential for this particular purpose could you walk through a little bit from the perspective of a consumer who is the Persona of the consumer of this information presumably someone who is looking at a credential that is in your network and how do they get access like what question are they asking in terms of trust about that credential.\ ✪
Nate_Otto_(he/him): That you're presenting answer that question.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): Yeah I mean the I would say that the consumer will be asking the question okay where's the is the credential well is the credential that I'm seeing where is the institution that I might be studying at is that is that the trustworthy an accredited Institution.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): Been for me the I would say the biggest challenges okay how do we and I think that in that way that God would give them it's a very well say it's a very binary yes-or-no type of answer because that's the whole European quality assurance framework is also about in that regards a lot about are showing minimum standard so it would just give you the information of courses this is an accredited University in the European higher education area or or.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): not it will not give you of course further details or any kind of waiting about the quality.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): I think the main challenge I see is how okay how do we get that information to the user and how do we connect how do we connect the way fiber credential institution my tissue to a student with the information on the trust information that could come from the car.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): Well I mean in Europe of course I'd is in higher education it's in the end it all comes back to the to how they belong and processes govern and that is that is I would start an international organization what is an international inter governmental process you will so you have 4149 - County to so 47 countries coming together who at the level of the.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): The common framework and agreed on the on the ESG and okay now we agree on a set of Standards we agree on the role of are kaiser official register of accreditation agencies so in a way they they gave the Mandate of course at International level I think that would be I mean that would get more.\ ✪
<deb_everhart_(credential_engine)> that's an example of QA agreed upon by jurisdiction-- there are also broader global concerns across jurisdictions\
Colin_(EQAR): Of course then you could go for you could imagine like a purely subsidiarity based approach where you say well every every country basically defines who are The Trusted we're just one who are the 12 those in in this country that that can decide on trusted issues in higher education and of course your has the advantage of having already a transnational approach.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): We need to look at every single country anymore but at International level of course that could be an option of following saying we're finding a solution where every country can published information who are The Trusted issues and that country.\ ✪
Deb_Everhart_(Credential_Engine): So that's that's a really good example of where the countries have come together and they've defined the jurisdiction right and then they've defined the quality assurance rules and processes within that jurisdiction and that's typically the way it's done that's not going to go away but there are increasingly needs for cross jurisdictional QA processes in part because.\ ✪
Deb_Everhart_(Credential_Engine): Our need to be more mobile right so if I got a particular license in the EU but then I moved to India what's the meaning of the quality assurance of that credential in in place where I live as distinct from the jurisdiction where it was issued so those types of processes are increasingly important and also that there are increasingly many many credentials that defy jurisdictions.\ ✪
Deb_Everhart_(Credential_Engine): so for example.\ ✪
Deb_Everhart_(Credential_Engine): If they're issued by a global company or if they're explicitly designed to have transfer value stay from you know one country to another or even from one state to another so my bottom line point I guess is that QA processes are extremely important and.\ ✪
Deb_Everhart_(Credential_Engine): In a world where we need these credentials to have meaning globally.\ ✪
<deb_everhart_(credential_engine)> where we can't have clear overall governance, we need as much transparent data as possible to provide guidance and meaning\
<colin_reynolds,_ed_design_lab> Do you have a sense of the ways this kind of development is being received, or thought about, by universities and higher ed institutions? Basically, are higher ed officials creating strategies for integrating credentials into their systems?\
Colin_(EQAR): Yeah that was my fault thanks yeah I just thought because I it that's a single question and to be honest I'm not 100% sure in I mean not even in Europe to what extent hi I mean how Keen higher education institutions and universities are on average to adopting very fabric redemptions or digital credentials of any sort them in their strategy I mean.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): on the one and of course we used.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): U.s. the u.s. pushing an infrastructure and developing an infrastructure to allow institutions to do that but I don't have any clear information yet on whether yeah how how fast I would see higher education institutions to take that up or not I think it also depends a lot on what do they see is them and for them I mean of course if there is a mite.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): it might be attractive to higher education.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): But of course that it will also depend on how much students will be asking for and how much students will be asked for having the deter very fiber credentials instead of traditional paper degrees so yeah hard to say I'm fine for now.\ ✪
<colin_reynolds,_ed_design_lab> thank you - we are seeing/experiencing much of the same in the US.\
Colin_(EQAR): So I just raised my hand once again for on the governance well say the governance question of international level and I do agree with what you said before that it's more of a government's issued under attack issue of course and Europe will has been kind of easy I would say because we do have an established governing structure at the European level and the international level you said yeah you have your lesko and letting on the one and it will make sense.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): Thought formal to discuss this matters within the UNESCO context also in relation to the global convention because I would always say well it's we shouldn't we shouldn't invent a new governing structure just because of a new tank but we should use the existing and establish governing structures and somehow connect them with the new tech rather than trying to invent a new governing structure but of course at the European level and so we had the international number might be more tricky because there is not.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): I mean UNESCO is there but on the other hand UNESCO is not governing an.\ ✪
<kaliya_identitywoman> Did GCCN come up as a meta directory or registries?\
Colin_(EQAR): Coastal area and in such a practical sounds I said say the European higher education area is governed by its governing structure so I think that that maybe makes it complex that on the one hand I think we should invent a new governing structure on the other hand there's not really an existing one at European level.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): Sorry at the international level.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): Yeah so I'm what is the gcn among.\ ✪
Kaliya Young: So it's the sum I'm not directly involved in this project but my close colleague Lucy Young on John Walker have been leading it GCC on is stands for Global covid certificate network but they've been working with undp and who.\ ✪
Kaliya Young: Our directory of trust Registries infrastructure using train.\ ✪
Kaliya Young: Come on the technology side of like how do you if you have trust Registries plural across the globe how do you find them and potentially you could use this infrastructure to list registries.\ ✪
Lucy Yang: I thought monster thank you clear for bringing you up I was listening I was think so what we're clear Mansion is what my colleague Ann and I were doing an initially from the covet and from Linux foundation and we recently moved to the United Nations development programme and work on that in collaboration with the who while because I believe shows working with the different large networks of Cobra credentials and now I'm moving beyond covid credentials.\ ✪
Lucy Yang: Stand figure out how different kind of network and.\ ✪
Lucy Yang: At the middle of Alaska we mentioned and one of the things I think probably someone is about to say like we leverage training because train use idns DNS attack so by leveraging existing like infrastructure that everyone probably has using especially government and companies and how we can leverage that infrastructure to actually help those different ecosystems just being discovered in a trusted manner at other Global level we're just a matter level because there are going to be more and more.\ ✪
Lucy Yang: Registries I think especially that's what we're seeing in the education sector I wasn't one of like that discussion I think two weeks ago there's some your Yura eura initiative in the you their small University kind of Consortium or ensuring credentials are talking about their preferring more kind of smaller networks and you know kind of rough trust Registries instead of like a bigger one so what you're going to do when you have so many of them out there and how you kind of being able to kind of cut.\ ✪
Lucy Yang: Discover them and knowing that they're be sure that they're safe.\ ✪
Lucy Yang: And help them connect you know doing key exchanges and other thing that's what we're pretty much doing for covid and but now I also expanding to other areas of of use cases happy to share more information we're about to launch at the openly like this but specification and an open source kind of core infrastructure and in early January so happy to either present or share more on this forum like when we have more information to share.\ ✪
Colin_(EQAR): The things that definitely sounds interesting I believe me can I ask you a question back basically what is the governance model or what's the decision model behind it I mean is it basically it's a eventually boils down to a peer-to-peer decision like every one eventually decides who Mel's they trust or what is the governance well yeah once the governance model behind it.\ ✪
Lucy Yang: I can respond if so so this is a question is not is just to be solved so we at least our work was started was technology and looking at existing because all the to covid not work we work with they're already in production so we're looking at their existing unprocess existing governance but idea is at the meta level is too.\ ✪
Lucy Yang: In a decentralized way in a sense of what we're looking at is we're not asking everyone to follow a very kind of comprehensive kind of governance but in but more in the sense that you have your own governance but to be participating to be discovered a meta level there are certain set of information you need to provide regardless of your governance and that information for example like who you are right and you know and some of like the document you were providing we like the matter platform needs to validate.\ ✪
Lucy Yang: Are you saying who you are and also are those informations are kind of legit.\ ✪
Lucy Yang: In from you so the matter what network is not saying that you'll just continue to do this and that because you can't do what you have to give them kind of their own like especially nation state or sovereignty but the same time being validating the trust information on the matter platform so this is the next step we're about to pick off a consultation period at the undp and in early in the first quarter of of next year so that hopefully this is something because we have figure out a lot of Technology requirements very very practical.\ ✪
Lucy Yang: Ones and Next Step needs to be figure out some look like the foundational governance piece and part reason why were using covid as.\ ✪
Lucy Yang: This is because a lot of things are real or not just a hypothetical so hopefully we have more to share it was just group as we progress thank you.\ ✪
<deb_everhart_(credential_engine)> thanks all!\
<naomi> Thank you!\
<colin_reynolds,_ed_design_lab> thank you for presenting and sharing, Colin\