The Swedish National Audit Office(SNAO)

1. System of financing higher education and research in Sweden and process of auditing its efficiency, effectiveness and equity Financing Education – towards more efficient, effective and equal system of education, Palić, Srbija Nina Gustafsson Åberg – The Swedish National Audit Office

2. The Swedish National Audit Office(SNAO) • Part of Parliamentary control. • SNAO has a mandate, through independent audits, to contribute to transparency and accountability. • To promote cost-effective use of resources as well as efficient and effective public administration. • Activities regulated by part of the Swedish Constitution and a number of Acts on Audit of Public Operations. • Financial audits. • Performance audits.

3. The Budget Bill Reporting Swedish National Audit Office Financial Audit Performance Audit Board Parliament Government Committees

4. Performance audit • Evaluation with accountability. • Promote development of state activities. • Enable the State to obtain good value for money. • Consider the general interest of society.

5. Performance audit – which bodies can be audited? • The Government, the Government Offices, the courts of law and the public agencies reporting to the Government, the administration of the Swedish Parliament and the Public agencies reporting to the Swedish Parliament; • The Royal Household and Establishment and the Royal Djurgården Park Administration; • Foundations and state-owned enterprises; • Entities using public grants and benefits, if the operations concerned are governed by law or the State has a controlling influence over them; • Unemployment benefit funds, as regards the management of unemployment benefits.

6. Financing higher education in Sweden • No tuitions for EU/EEA nationals. • Central government funds higher education. • Maximum amount of grant per HEI decided by the parliament. • Funding per student registered and per yearly student performance (based on ECTS credits). • The amount of money per student and yearly student performance depends on subject area. • Parliament and government does not decide the number of students per subject area. • HEI are allowed to save 10 percent of their grant per year.

7. Financing research in Sweden • Direct appropriations – 46 percent of funds 2009 • Decided by parliament. • Directly to HEI. • HEI decides on how to allocate and use the appropriation… • …but it should be used for research and third-cycle education (doctoral education). • Grants – 54 percent of funds 2009 • Allocated by public and private organisations – application, peer-review. • Public organisations - governmental authorities, science councils, public foundations, EU. • Private organisations - foundations, companies.

8. Auditing higher education and research • Important part of the public sector. • Costs were 2 billion EUR 2009 for higher education and 2,5 billion EUR for research. • Performance audits on: • Resource control in first-cycle higher education; • Classification of courses at universities; • High quality in higher education?; • Employability of university students – efforts made by the Government and individual universities; • Lecturer´s hours of work at university and colleges – planning and monitoring; • Recruiting international students to Swedish HEIs; • International students in higher education; • Unused research grants at higher education institutions (not published).

9. Resource control in first-cycle higher education • Not enough resources to secure the quality of the education? • Indications of underdeveloped resource-control mechanisms in higher education institutions. • Audit question: Have the universities audited taken action to promote the efficient use of resources in first-cycle education? • Examined how resources allocated translate into resources devoted to students.

10. Resource control in first-cycle higher education • Assessment criteria. • Law on higher education. • Law on state budget. • Three universities audited. • Examined processes of resource allocation within the HEI. • Examined documents and performed interviews. • Flexible use of resources. • Operational costs need to be made more visible. • Need for better knowledge about actual costs for courses and programmes. • Improved follow-up of resource allocation at the department level.

11. Recommendations from the audit • The SNAO recommends that the three universities should strengthen their resource control of undergraduate education, thus creating the requisite conditions for more efficient use of resources, by: • accounting for costs at a level showing how resources are used and what courses/programmes cost; • developing their internal follow-up of resource use, not only to meet the need for a basis for decisions that is common to the entire university but also to make it possible to provide the Government with better information about undergraduate education.

12. Unused external research grants • Increase of unused research grants 5,5 billion SEK 1997 to 12,8 billion SEK 2009. • Big and fast increase in unused research grants. • Audit questions: • Have HEIs made sure they can receive the grants and make use of them in an efficient manner? • Has the government made sure that grants allocated are made use of in an efficient manner?

13. Unused external research grants • Method: • Analysed national data and statistics. • Three case studies. • Interviews with concerned actors (HEI, government, science council). • Assessment criteria: • Law on higher education • Budget law • Contract between HEI/researcher and financier

14. Unused external research grants • Takes longer time today than 2004 to turn funds into research. • Increased research grants does not explain this pattern. • Incentive for researchers and HEI to save funds: • Insecure employment. • Difficulties planning availability of future funds and number students. • Administrative problems. • Concentration of funds to few centres of excellence and researchers. • Insufficient follow-up on research grants.