On the initiative of the National Center for Quality Assurance, an online meeting was held with the internal quality assurance managers of the monitored secondary vocational education institutions. The purpose of the meeting was to assess the impact of monitoring in secondary vocational education institutions on the processes of the enhancement of internal quality assurance systems and educational programs.
The participants of the meeting emphasised the importance of monitoring, which helps them to be skilled in quality assurance activities and get a better idea of the accreditation process. The quality assurance managers of the educational institutions noted some achievements they have gained as a result of the monitoring. These are the deepening of relations with the stakeholders, the conduct of regular surveys among the students, the collection of the necessary data, the proper presentation of the work done, the documentation, the training of internal quality assurance experts.
Among the achievements, the participants especially attached importance to the active process of educational institution’s internal communication and cooperation. Some quality assurance specialists mentioned they have started working more closely with career centres, chairs, employers and have signed new memorandums of cooperation with employers, which have had a positive impact on the quality assurance process.
Touching upon the professional academic programs, some educational institutions mentioned they have reviewed the academic programs from the angle of content and formatting.
During the meeting, the participants also discussed the issues of monitoring frequency and format, according to which the educational institutions suggested to increase the number of annual monitorings, to focus on a small number of standards, but to carry out more in-depth evaluation, especially in case of negatively assessed standards. That will stand as an example of the evaluation for other standards.
The participants of the meeting expressed a wish to conduct monitoring offline, not remotely if possible, as in their opinion that will be more useful. ANQA representatives promised to consider the proposal in case of the decline of the pandemic rates. So a conference is planned to be held in December, during which the colleges will share their experience, problems they overcame and give recommendations to other colleges.
Let us remind you that the meeting on summarizing the results of the monitoring of HEI-s has already taken place.
The organized monitorings have a partnership nature and help higher and secondary vocational education institutions to identify weaknesses, to be skilled in the quality assurance process, to better understand the accreditation process.