The engineering accreditation process for STEM-designated study programs: Ukrainian Catholic University case.

The accreditation process in the Higher education system in each country is about verifying the compliance with the criteria that a specific governmental institution has established or/and an independent organization is using currently. The University presented in this paper is a non-profit educational institution. It states in its mission the goal of "forming leaders to serve with professional excellence in the home country and internationally – for the glory of God, the common good, and the dignity of the human person." The university's internal managerial approach is to support the startup culture. This paper aims to apply the accreditation process as a prerequisite to improving the internal processes. This background provides the guiding toolkit input data for the study programs' design and revision. Thus the final goal is to make the continuous improvement approach clear to all stakeholders. The author has conducted the data collection process and further analysis based on the personal experience of undergoing the accreditation process for one Master's program and two undergraduate study programs (Faculty of Applied Sciences). The methodology of the process-driven organization is at the foundation of the research. The process requires the academic directors of the program, professors, and students to comply with the National Agency of Quality Assurance (NAQA) criteria. The outcome of the analysis is a flexible dashboard as a process mapping tool. The central actors are the set of stakeholders: program directors, professors, students, internal supporting departments, and external stakeholders. There are two focuses of the study. The first one is to explain the accreditation criteria and the quality assurance regulations with the cases of university study programs when the actual compliance checking is taking place. The other one is the time between accreditation and the events that happen within the Faculty of Applied Sciences. Furthermore, the description of the results uses a process-oriented methodology as the most appropriate for this problem statement. The process approach makes one think of the set of inputs (people, technology, and information) in an activity that will get you to the (expected) outcomes (outputs). Process thinking changes how one sets up the three elements, executes the activities, and analyzes the gained value. This methodology is widely used to adopt continuous improvement goals. By applying a process-oriented approach and data-driven decision, there is an improved dashboard designed and the build-in markers are presented to improve the experience of the main stakeholders.