This paper contributes to the discussion on public policies linked to the last two versions of Brazilian institutional assessment, called National Assessment System of Higher Education. The first one was implanted by Fernando Henrique Cardoso's administration, and the second one improved by Lula's government. Both are referred to the context of the social demand for expansion and diversification of school registration in higher education, the Brazilian State incapacity to meet them, the consequent growing privatization of that education level and a probable make-believe intended to exhibit a certain regulation of the quality of education provision. Its last part considers the rescue of Brazilian assessment in the molds of the Program of Assessment of the Brazilian Institutional Universities (PAIUB) and radically separates assessment from regulation.
Institutional Assessment; Brazilian higher education assessment system; Academic quality