Quality

Quality is one of the distinguishing features that have turned LCI Barcelona into an educational institution ever-attentive to the changing needs of our students. All professors and campus support staff share a series of values associated with the excellence with which we do our work each day. 

Following this line, we at LCI Barcelona School of Higher Education strive for quality in everything we do. Providing ample proof of this is our Quality Policy and our action plan to increase the quality of the teaching-learning process —with the definition of an education plan—, the tools we use and the ongoing processes of review and improvement at the School.

In 2015, the Catalan University Quality Assurance Agency (AQU Catalunya) approved the design of our School's Internal Quality Management System (SGIQ) based on the AUDIT-EAS program. Since then, the SGIQ has been implemented gradually and is periodically reviewed to keep it up to date, as established by the School's quality objectives. The SGIQ includes the definition of internal quality assurance processes that enable the continuous management and improvement of training programs, of teaching-learning process and student support, of external practices, of student mobility programs, of academic staff and of services and material resources. Our main objective is to achieve the best academic results, satisfaction and job placement outcomes possible for the students and alumni of LCI Barcelona, not to mention support in their personal growth.

This SGIQ is essential, since the School offers one Bachelor of Arts in Design with four modalities (see documentation).

Higher Art Education is part of university education in Spain, as shown in the following table. Source of the image: Ministry of Education.

 

Thus, our Bachelor of Arts in Design is equivalent to a university degree, with all of them corresponding to MECES level 2. The three masters of Arts that we offer are equivalent to university Master's degrees, with all corresponding to MECES level 3.

The legal framework for Higher Art Education is provided by Organic Education Law 2/2006, developed in Royal Decree 1614/2009. The latter already incorporates all the elements to ensure convergence with the European Higher Education Area (EHEA). As a result, all official degrees had to be adapted to the EHEA after its publication.

The fundamental objectives of the EHEA are to place the student at the center of the education system and to harmonize the different national systems to promote mobility so they may study and enter the job market in other countries. Different initiatives were launched in this regard, such as the ERASMUS exchange program (which has recently evolved towards ERASMUS +) and the European Degree Supplement (EDS), the establishment of a common mechanism to calculate a student's dedication to a program (ECTS credits, the European Credit Transfer and Accumulation System), the recognition of credits and the establishment of a common European framework for degrees (EQF, European Qualifications Framework). At LCI Barcelona we take full advantage of the benefits of this shared European space to remain open to as many international students as possible and promote our students' mobility.

Higher Art Education in Catalonia is the responsibility of the Catalan Ministry of Education, which in 2012 established an agreement with AQU to include these studies in the Verification, Monitoring, Modification and Accreditation framework (VSMA), so that the programs are subject to the same external quality assurance processes as university and Master's degrees. Thus, in 2013, our Bachelor's Degree in Design (now, Bachelor of Arts in Design) was verified, and in an event at the headquarters of AQU Catalunya, the final evaluation reports of all the verified degrees were submitted to the directors of the schools, including the director of LCI Barcelona School of Higher Education.

In accordance with the VSMA framework, at the School we monitor all our degrees each year so we can identify possible areas for improvement and take the right steps to maintain a high level of excellence, which is included in the Improvement Plan. The result is a process of continuous improvement of our degrees, which is one of the School's quality objectives. The monitoring reports of the official degrees are supervised by AQU Catalunya and the indicators of the degrees are published on our website.

Finally, we are committed to transparency and to the objective of working tirelessly so our students can acquire the knowledge, tools and values they need to become competitive professionals in a global world and responsible citizens committed to society.