Response to news article accreditation International Business

Today, 7 June 2023, Dutch newspaper Dagblad van het Noorden published an online article in which an employee of Hanze UAS claims there has been potential misconduct at the accreditation of one of the International Business bachelor programme. After this signal came to us in late 2022, we immediately started an internal investigation. This investigation revealed that a certain aspect of the accreditation of International Business should have gone differently. We have informed the Accreditation Organisation of the Netherlands and Flanders (NVAO) as well as the Inspectorate of Education and, of course, we will take necessary steps to ensure that such a situation is avoided in the future. 

We see no reason to doubt the quality of the study programme or to assume that the final assessment of the programme would have been different. The accreditation committee was very positive about the study programme in question and the recent interim report also shows this. 

It is not known to us whether any potential misconduct surrounding the accreditation has been reported before the end of 2022. At no time did the person concerned make a formal report about this through the internal channels that exist for this purpose, such as to the Exam Board, or the Executive Board. 

We deeply regret this situation. Accreditation processes are an important element of our quality assurance, which we value highly. The fact that things happened within this process that possibly should have been done differently shows once again that we, as an organisation, need to be continuously mindful of our work processes. In this way, we are doing our utmost to prevent repetition so that a high standard of education is guaranteed for the future as well.