ABSTRACT
When New Zealand's Academic Audit Unit was established in 1993, several of the United Kingdom's terms of reference were copied, including the phrase 'quality and Standards'. Quality means meeting or fulfilling requirements, often referred to as fitness for purpose, where the purpose is set out in the objectives of the higher education institution. Quality assurance agencies generally review the institutions under their aegis at either institutional level or at programme/discipline level. The word 'standard' denotes a level or grade, such as an explicit level of academic attainment. This chapter outlines international benchmarking, Universitas 21 and course experience questionnaire. Universitas 21 is a network of about a dozen broadly based research universities, in Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the UK and USA. New Zealand's universities have long been involved in the traditional form of national and international academic 'benchmarking' by virtue of joint research work, peer review of research proposals and journal articles, study leave, external examiners and so on.
