Building a Culture of Trust in Higher Education Institutions

Abstract

Higher education institutions worldwide are evolving in a so-called quality assurance era in which quality standards are defined and implemented. Quality assurance has, in fact, two sides: one declarative, or formal, reflected into documents, proofs, and even statistics well prepared, and one practical, or informal, that behind all legal issues, the quality of processes is real. The contradiction between the two sides of the quality assurance contributes a false perception of quality and unethical institutional behavior. Higher education institutions can become ethical or more ethical through their people—management, academics, students, alumni, researchers. In other words, the culture of quality needs to be rebuilt towards trust. The objective of this chapter is to provide a clear insight to the contemporary state of higher education institutions' behavior and context to contribute to the building up of new quality management based on a trust in the area of education, research, and social development.