Quality Assurance and Professional Accreditation national developments

1
Quality Assurance and Professional Accreditation
-national developments

• Bryan Maguire
• Higher Education Training Awards Council
• And never the twain shall meet? conference
  exploring quality assurance and professional
  accreditation/recognition in a changing world
• 17 October, 2006

2
Outline

• Change in the professions
• Change in education and training systems
• national framework of qualifications
• quality assurance
• Approaches to accreditation
• Issues arising

3
Education and the Professions

• Universities were originally founded, in part, to
  educate for the professions
• Professional bodies have maintained independence
  of government and providers
• Recognition or accreditation of programmes of
  education and training is a mechanism of
  controlling entry to profession and maintaining
  standards

4
Aspects of self-regulation

• Pros
• Flexibility in evolution of structures
• Comparability with other jurisdictions (common vs
  civil law)
• Consumer protection
• Development of professions
• Low cost
• Cons
• Lack of accountability
• Small scale
• System complexity
• Inconsistency of practice
• Limited enforcement

5
Changing professional bodies

• Increased regulatory functions
• Health and Social Care Professions Act (2005)
  (displacing self-regulation onto new statutory
  body)
• Building Control Bill (2006) (formalising
  regulatory function of existing bodies)
• Growth of service economy
• Increasing number of professions and
  professionals
• Professionalisation of professional bodies
• Complexification of professional practice and
  training

6
Qualifications Framework

• a framework for the development, recognition and
  award of qualifications in the State, based on
  standards of knowledge, skill or competence to be
  acquired by learners (Qualifications Act, 1999)
• The single, nationally and internationally
  accepted entity, through which all learning
  achievements may be measured and related to each
  other in a coherent way and which defines the
  relationship between all education and training
  awards (Qualifications Authority, Policies
  Criteria, April 2002)

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Purpose of framework

• a coherent national policy approach to
  qualifications
• lifelong learning society
• new kinds of work and career
• need for a more flexible system of qualifications
• need for portability of qualifications
• international comparison and alignment
• European policy trends and processes Lisbon,
  Copenhagen and Bologna

8
Vision for the recognition of learning

• Recognition of all learning activity undertaken
  throughout life, with the aim of improving
  knowledge, skills and competences within a
  personal, civic, social and/or employment-related
  perspective

9
Framework outline

• architecture Levels, Award-types, Named Awards
• a structure of 10 levels (lifelong learning)
• level indicators of learning outcomes
• 10 level grid of indicators, defined in terms of
  8 dimensions of knowledge, know-how skill and
  competence (substrands)

10
The National Framework of Qualifications
award-types and awarding bodies
11
Professional awards and the framework

• Professional awards as a system of learning
  recognition acknowledged by framework developers
  from the beginning
• Policies and Criteria for the Inclusion in, or
  Alignment with, the National Framework of
  Qualifications of the Awards of Certain Awarding
  Bodies, published by the Authority in July 2006,
  following extensive consultation

12
Inclusion alignment

• Group A Irish bodies with statutory power to
  make awards (awards may be included)
• Group B Irish bodies with regulatory functions
  (learning outcomes of awards may be aligned with
  framework award-types or levels)
• Group C Bodies from outside the State, included
  in their home national frameworks, making awards
  to Irish learners, subject to quality assurance,
  (learning outcomes of awards may be aligned with
  framework award-types or levels)

13
Professional awards outside the framework?

• Inclusion/alignment voluntary processes
• National policy, expressed in legislation,
  favours recognition through framework
• Compatibility with broader international
  developments achieved through framework
• Awards Councils will work with any body (whether
  or not eligible for inclusion/alignment) that
  wishes to develop Council awards for its field of
  learning

14
Criteria applicable to all framework processes

• Standards based on learning outcomes
• Quality assurance arrangements
• Fair and consistent assessment of learners
• Arrangements for access, transfer and progression

15
Quality assurance in HE

• Growth internationally
• Europe ENQA, European Stds Guides
• Globally INQAAHE, UNESCO/OECD guides
• Three regimes in Ireland
• Universities
• HETAC
• DIT
• Shared interests IHEQN

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Quality assurance - universities

• Universities Act (1997)
• Universities responsible for QA
• Review by department
• Delegated external review functions to IUQB
• System reviewed by HEA
• QA procedures arranged in accordance with A
  Framework for Quality in Irish Universities
  (IUQB)
• Each university has it own Quality Assurance
  policy

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Quality assurance institutes of technology
other colleges

• Qualifications Act (1999)
• HETAC for HE in institutes of technology and
  independent colleges
• Programme accreditation and review
• Delegation of authority to institutes of
  technology to award and accredit programmes
• Provider QA procedures agreed by HETAC
• Provider QA effectiveness reviewed by HETAC
• DIT responsible for QA published procedures
• DIT QA effectiveness reviewed by NQAI

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Professional body accreditation

• setting up and maintaining proper standards of
  professional and general education and training
  for admission to membership or to any category of
  membership of the Institution, with power to
  provide and prescribe instruction and courses of
  study and to conduct examinations for the purpose
  of maintaining such standards
• Engineers Ireland charter

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Effects of professional accreditation for learners

• Recognition of learning
• Membership of community of peers
• Legal right to title
• Legal right to practice
• Market effect
• Varies in breadth and importance

20
Effects of professional accreditation for
providers

• Quality assurance
• Standard setting
• Peer recognition (domestic international)
• Marketing
• Disciplinary advancement
• Internal resource competition factor

21
Diversity of professional accreditation

• Direct provision and assessment
• Direct assessment, provision neutral
• Programme recognition plus assessment
• Partial programme recognition
• Full recognition of programme and assessment

22
Possible tensions
Resource Management
Programme
Professional accreditation
Academic QA
23
Common features of professional academic
accreditation - standards

• Specification of standards
• Learning outcomes (knowledge, skill and
  competence)
• Input (curricular content)
• Input (programme resources, staff levels and
  competence)
• Input (student selection)

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Common features of professional academic
accreditation - process

• Criteria
• Peers
• Independence
• Periodic review

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Issues

• Do professional and academic QA have distinct
  contributions to make or are they redundant?
• How much does accreditation cost and is it worth
  it?
• Can (should) professional bodies and academic
  authorities agree common standards?
• Can (should) professional bodies and academic QA
  share accreditation processes?