Towards Establishing an Integrated System of Quality Assurance in South African Higher Education Libraries

Abstract

Recent demands for evidence of quality and the impact of library services on teaching and research require libraries to demonstrate accountability and responsiveness to a divergent range of user needs. In 2004 the Committee for Higher Education Librarians in South Africa (CHELSA) recognized a need for an agreed set of criteria, standards and models for quality assurance and the critical success factors for self assessment in university libraries. CHELSA therefore established its own Quality Assurance Subcommittee to provide libraries with clear and practical direction in preparing for mandated national higher education quality audits and to operationalize an ongoing process of library performance evaluation according to agreed measures. The author, a member of this Subcommittee, charts the progress towards building consensus and establishing an integrated system and process of quality assurance at South African university libraries on the basis of international standards.