- guardian.co.uk, Tuesday February 13 2007 14.49 GMT
Postgraduate degree programmes are well managed and follow codes of conduct to provide good value for money, according to the Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education (QAA).
The QAA today released two reports - one covering England and Northern Ireland and the other Wales - based on surveys of 124 higher education institutions.
The overall picture emerging from the surveys was highly positive, the QAA said. The reports said institutions showed good levels of engagement with the QAA code of practice for postgraduate research programmes and that many universities offered examples of good practice.
The purpose of the report was to ensure that all institutions receiving funding for research students had policies and procedures in place to secure and improve the quality and standards of research degree programmes.
Peter Williams, the chief executive of the QAA, said: "These outcomes show that universities are taking good care of their postgraduate research students. This represents an improvement on past indicators and should greatly benefit these students.
"The process of reviewing postgraduate research programmes will be fully integrated in future into our institutional audit process in England and Northern Ireland."
