The Standing Committee was established in October 1999 to develop detailed proposals for a more streamlined approach to quality assurance in initial teacher education in Scotland. It is chaired by Harvey Stalker, HMCI, and includes representatives from all the relevant stakeholders - GTC, Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education, SHEFC, ADES, professional associations, COSHEP, Scottish Teacher Education Committee and schools.
As part of his report on teacher education and training in Scotland on behalf of the Dearing Committee of Inquiry in 1997, Sir Stewart Sutherland recommended that "the Scottish Office should begin a dialogue with the other stakeholders in teacher education about the effectiveness of the current arrangements to guarantee and measure quality, and the scope for reducing duplication". His report also recommended that HMI and SHEFC should be invited to consider whether HMI might have a role in assessing subject provision between full assessments of teacher education.
SOEID responded in two ways. Firstly, on 27 November 1997 Brian Wilson, the Minister for Education, announced that he proposed to reinstate the power of HM Inspectorate to inspect teacher education provided by higher education institutions. He also intimated that he intended to reduce the overall burden of quality assurance on teacher education providers and that to implement this policy the Department proposed to establish a Short-Term Working Group, chaired by the then Secretary of the Department, Gerald Wilson, and consisting of all the relevant stakeholders. That committee reported in January 1999.
It recommended that HMI should convene a group consisting of all the relevant bodies to
The SCQUAITE is that Standing Committee.
The membership is provided as an annex to this paper.
At its first meeting in October 1999, SCQUAITE committed itself to the establishment, through consultation, of "a quality assurance model which does the job effectively, desirably through one lean, economical process which serves the need of all key stakeholders". That is, whatever system is developed must be able to satisfy the following bodies:
It has decided to set up two working groups both of which draw their membership from the relevant stakeholders. The first of these is chaired by Jim Dignan, HMI, and is concerned to undertake detailed work on the two main features of the new approach: the internal quality assurance arrangements currently operated by TEIs, and collaborative review. The second group is chaired by Professor Bart McGettrick and will focus on benchmarking. One of the features of the new arrangements being introduced by the Quality Assurance Agency for all of higher education is that benchmarking statements are being established in each domain of study to identify what is judged to represent an appropriate level of achievement at the end of a programme. The SCQUAITE Benchmarking Group is expected to bring forward proposals of this kind for initial teacher education, relying, for obvious reasons, on the widely accepted statement of competences for initial teacher education.
Both of these working groups will report regularly to the Standing Committee and it will be for the Standing Committee to satisfy itself that the proposals from the two groups are in line with its expectations.
SCQUAITE has considered that there are two key issues that need to be addressed. The first of these concerns internal QA systems. SCQUAITE believes that all TEIs have well developed internal systems. What it will be seeking, in the interests of disseminating good practice, is a greater degree of consistency of approach across all TEIs. The second issue concerns collaborative review. This is a complex matter, for it is not an easy task to develop a single mechanism of QA that will meet all the needs of all the different stakeholders. However, SCQUAITE believes that a robust approach to collaborative review will depend on sound internal QA systems.
The terms of reference of SCQUAITE make it clear that it must come forward with carefully considered and sensitive ways in which off-campus learning will be quality assured as effectively as TEI-based studies. Here, it will be important to find ways of extending schools' existing self-evaluation procedures, developed through the Quality Initiative in Scottish Schools, to include the school-based components of ITE.
SCQUAITE is aware of the complexity of the matter and is committed to the widest consultation to ensure that the best insights available in the educational community are gathered so that a model of quality assurance is developed which will not only be robust, but will carry the support of all concerned. It is for this reason that the membership of SCQUAITE is widely drawn, as is the membership of its two working groups. It is anticipated that there will be a number of rounds of consultation. The first of these, involving benchmarking, will begin in the Spring of 2000. The expectation is that consultation on all aspects of the new arrangements will be completed before the end of December 2000. The aim is to pilot the new approach from October 2001 and to introduce the new arrangements from October 2002.
SCQUAITE hopes that all with an interest in the well-being of teacher education, and with a commitment to ensuring that a more streamlined and appropriate QA system is introduced, will take advantage of the opportunities for consultation that will be provided in the coming months.
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