**4. Conceptual orientation of the study**

The government primarily finances higher education in Ghana. Education covers 23.3% of Ghana's fiscal budget [18]. Out of this, 21.6% is allocated to the higher education sector [18] but unfortunately, this falls short of the funds required by Ghanaian higher education institutions due to growth in student enrolment. This situation has triggered several financial initiatives. The government has established Ghana Education Trust (GET) to assist higher education institutions with additional funds for infrastructural development [19] but this excludes private higher education institutions. Ghanaian private higher education institutions only obtain financial assistance from the government in the form of tax exemptions. Though these appear to have enhanced the financial viability of most private Ghanaian higher education institutions, compared to peers in the global north, higher education is still under‐

Ghanaian higher education institutions have been placed mainly under two external quality regulators, the National Council for Tertiary Education (NCTE) and the National Accreditation Board (NAB) to monitor and control academic activities. NCTE oversees the proper administra‐ tion of schools tagged as higher education institutions. It is responsible for ensuring that the aca‐ demic activities of higher education institutions are financially sustainable and support national development [15, 20]. NAB on the other hand is Ghana's key quality assurance agency. It was established through the enactment of the NAB law 1993 (PNDC Law 317) but has subsequently been replaced by National Accreditation Board Act, 2007, Act 774 [21]. Its primary responsi‐ bility is to safeguard quality higher education provision in the country. NAB's main quality assurance strategy is accreditation. This covers institutions and academic programmes [15, 21]. In addition, NAB uses a strategy known as "affiliation" to ensure quality education delivery by outsourcing its quality improvement mandate to Ghanaian public universities. Affiliation in this context refers to a relationship in which, by mutual agreement, the affiliating partner agrees to accredit the academic programmes and issues academic awards to an affiliated part‐ ner institution [22]. In this regard, NAB requires Ghanaian higher education institutions, espe‐ cially private university colleges, polytechnics, and specialised public colleges to be affiliated to long established Ghanaian public universities in order to offer academic programmes. This affiliation relationship is expected to last for a minimum of 10 years [23], and it is intended that the universities assist these institutions in building their internal capacity for quality assurance. Professional associations are also major players in the enactment of quality assurance in the Ghanaian higher education system. Examples of such associations in Ghana are Ghana Medical and Dental Council, Nurses and Midwifery Council of Ghana, General Legal Council, and the Ghana Pharmacy Council [24–27]. Their involvement includes accreditation of professional study programmes, participation in accreditation panels set up by NAB and participation in curriculum review exercises [28]. Though these roles played by external quality assurance regulators have enhanced the image, deepened public trust and increased the attractiveness of Ghanaian higher education institutions, external quality assurance is still going through

funded, impacting negatively on the quality of higher education system.

30 Global Voices in Higher Education

**3. Quality assurance in Ghana's higher education system**

reforms and can best be described as "work‐in‐progress".

This study sought to answer the question "What do quality assurance frameworks of higher education institutions in Ghana give the least attention to, and why?" This question requires a focus on key operational areas that higher education institutions are responsible for. A "PPP" conceptual framework, which argues that higher education institutions are responsible for people, programmes, and facilities, was adopted for the study. The "PPP" is an acronym for people, programme, and place. The PPP was used by Filardo [29], the Executive Director of Twenty‐First Century School Fund of the District of Columbia in the United States. She described PPP as a concept for planning physical facilities in education. PPP is a logical framework that could be used for classifying and analysing the operational activities of higher education institu‐ tions for the purpose of quality assurance and hence its adoption and adaptation. From a logical standpoint, a quality assurance framework for any higher education institution in Ghana ought to give attention to people, programme, and place in a balanced manner if it is to sufficiently address stakeholders' expectations of higher education quality. From the perspective of the PPP concept, a balanced quality assurance framework looks like **Figure 1**.

**Figure 1.** Balancing the focus of a QA framework in HEIs.

"People" in the context of the PPP framework for higher education is taken to refer to the coverage of internal and external stakeholders in quality assurance activities of higher edu‐ cation institutions. In a typical university context in Ghana, internal stakeholders include the governing council members, management team members, senior academic and administra‐ tive members, senior staff, junior staff, and junior members (students). External stakeholders on the other hand include graduates, employers of graduates, professional representatives, regulatory authorities representatives, and funders [30]. Given that quality has multiple per‐ spectives which demand alignment of different perspectives [28], quality assurance activities within higher education institutions ought to cover and involve all these key stakeholders. Enhancing quality in higher education demands qualified and highly motivated staff mem‐ bers who are committed to quality outcomes [31]. This involves staff participation in quality assurance activities through effective and efficient top‐down and bottom‐up communication channels and rigorous staff recruitment processes, development, and incentive systems [31]. It also requires qualified, highly motivated, and empowered students who provide feed‐ back on their learning experiences to inform improvement activities [32]. Equally, achieving quality also involves information from all key internal and external stakeholders through feedback loops [31].

"Programme" in the context of the PPP framework for higher education represents all the processes, procedures, and activities within an institution. This includes curricular design, teaching and learning, governance systems, leadership and management func‐ tions, professional development of staff, research and outreach activities, student assess‐ ment, staff recruitment, student admissions, institutional ceremonies, student support services, and partnership and cooperation. A quality assurance framework of a higher education institution ought to cover all these in addition to other operational areas and activities of the institution in order to sufficiently guarantee and enact stakeholders' expectations of quality.

"Place" on the other hand stands for space and facilities of an educational institution. It has been argued that maintaining and improving quality in higher education is directly pro‐ portional to the quality of facilities and space [33, 34, 35]. Appropriate space and facilities are required to support every activity of any higher education institution [35]. The quality of learning, teaching, research, and community service of a higher education institution is dependent on space and facilities of the institution [35]. Therefore, place ought to attract equal attention in a quality assurance framework of any higher education institution just like people and programmes. The common physical facilities which are usually under the microscope of QA activities are teaching and learning, residential, recreational, and transportation facilities, in addition to space for physical facilities development. The inter‐ play of people, programme, and place supports positive outcomes in higher education. Quality is maintained and enhanced at the intersection of the circles containing the PPP as depicted in **Figure 1**. Quality cannot be maintained and enhanced by giving negligible attention to any part of the PPP framework discussed so far because high‐quality educa‐ tional outcomes depend on quality people and their involvement, quality programmes, and quality facilities.
