Quality assurance
Quality assurance is important for the continual improvement of research. At the basis of the quality assurance process is the Standard Evaluation Protocol (SEP). The research of all public research organisations in the Netherlands is assessed by means of the SEP. It stipulates that every research unit must carry out a self-evaluation once every three years. In addition, the research activities need to be assessed by an external peer review panel once every six years. The results of this peer review are made public in a report. Some units, like Caphri, also publish their own mid term reviews.
The Executive Board is responsible for the research assessment. To facilitate the internal self-evaluations and the external assessments, an internal protocol for Maastricht University has been developed.
In 1992, the Research School Accreditation Committee (ECOS) was created by the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts & Sciences (KNAW). The ECOS is the research school accreditation board for all Dutch universities. The ECOS-protocol is used for this purpose. Once obtained, the accreditation is valid for six years. Subsequently, the research school should submit a request for re-accreditation. It is possible, and endeavoured as often as possible, to use the external SEP-evaluation as a basis for the accreditation or re-accreditation request.
