Latvia

image/svg+xml Map of the European Higher Education Area (EHEA) Map of the European Higher Education Area (EHEA) A blank map of the European Higher Education Area (EHEA) and countries fully surrounded by the EHEA. Every country has an id which is its ISO-3116-1-ALPHA2 code in lower case. Members of the EU have a class="eu", all EHEA countries have a class="europe", non-EHEA countries have a class="nonehea". Image based on https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Blank_map_of_Europe_(with_disputed_regions).svg by Júlio "Tintazul" Reis and Marian "maix" Sigler. Made by Colin Tück, EQAR, 2017 Released under CreativeCommons Attribution ShareAlike (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.5/).
  • Governmental membership
    Latvia has been a Governmental Member of EQAR since May 2011.

    Map: EHEA countries by governmental membership

  • General information on higher education

    Higher education in Latvia is offered by academies (akadēmijas), universities (universitātes), colleges (koledža) and universities of applied sciences (augstskolas).

    The body overseing the national network of educational institutions, setting the educational standards and determining teacher training content and procedures is the Ministry of Education and Science.

  • National external quality assurance requirements

    • Accreditation of study directions (groups of study programmes in a field or discipline)
      for 6 years, 2 years or 0 years with different conditions attached. In Latvia the study programmes are grouped into 29 study directions – these refer to thematic groups of study programmes within each HEI.

    • Accreditation of an institution of higher education or college
      Higher education institutions are accredited under this process for an indefinite term. Extraordinary or exceptional accreditation of a HEI can also be initiated in cases where there is a violation of law/regulatory acts.

    • Licensing of study programme
      grants rights to a higher education institution or its branches to implement a new study programme.

  • EHEA key commitment

    Fully aligned with the ESG

    A fully functioning quality assurance system is in operation nationwide, in which all higher education institutions are subject to regular external quality assurance by an agency that has successfully demonstrated compliance with the Standards and Guidelines for Quality Assurance in the EHEA (ESG) through registration on EQAR

    Map: implementation of the EHEA key commitment

  • Cross-border quality assurance

    Recognising EQAR-registered agencies as part of the national external QA requirements

    In August 2017 Latvian government has approved an amendment to the Law on HEIs (ratified by the Latvian parliament in 2018) to allow EQAR-registered agencies to carry out external QA within the country.

    • Eligibility requirements for foreign agencies: Registration on EQAR is sufficient.

    • Conditions for the agencies’ work (e.g. criteria to be used): The higher education institution or college has to inform the Academic Information Center (AIC) within 10 working days of its submission for a cross-border accreditation. The Agency shall ensure that the study direction is assessed in accordance with the national requirements as specified in the Law On Institutions of Higher Education (see Chapter IV and V) i.e. nomination of a minimum of five experts; including observers from the student and trade union; use of the evaluation scale (excellent, good, mediocre, unsatisfactory) etc.

    • Recognition of reviews carried out by foreign agencies: The higher education institution or college shall submit the assessment of the study direction to the Committee for the Accreditation of Studies, who will make the final decision (to accept or refuse) the accreditation of the study direction.

    Map: recognition of cross-border quality assurance

  • European Approach for Quality Assurance of Joint Programmes

    European Approach not available to higher education institutions

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    Map: availability of the European Approach for QA of Joint Programmes

  • Permalink
    https://data.deqar.eu/country/94/
  • Further information

Registered agencies operating in Latvia

Governmental Membership in EQAR

… allows countries to …

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