Part 3

Lessons of Experience

 3.7 What quality assurance and monitoring and evaluation mechanisms exist? 

On the ACCESSDL&T: ECD programme, there is no formal system for monitoring quality of provision on an ongoing basis. However, external institutions moderate assessment and the final assessment takes into account a portfolio of a learner’s work as well as requiring a successful rating of teaching practice by a practising teacher, although this person is not employed by the college. Attempts are made to ensure a degree of consistency in the quality of service provided by employing experienced staff, including ex-participants who have been head-hunted, and providing a Course Presenter’s Handbook, a School Principal/Supervisor’s Information Booklet as well as marking memos and notes in manuals for tutors. In addition, tutors meet for an annual workshop and there are ad hoc visits to centres by national office staff. 

For the UNISA: ABET programme there is a similar lack of a formal system for monitoring the course and visits to centres from central management staff are of an ad hoc nature as initiated by the centres themselves. Assessment is, again, externally moderated. 

As with the previous programmes, no formal monitoring system is in place for the UP: B.Cur. programme. Some tutors have taken it upon themselves to try to get feedback from learners, but very little information is available. Since the B.Cur. programme prepares learners for a teaching role, learners must pass Nursing Education Practica by successfully delivering a series of lectures. 

The WITS:FDE programme is subject to the same external evaluation procedures as traditional programmes, and the final grammar assignment of the course is contextualised by a request for feedback from learners on their experience of the course as a whole. 

The UOFS: BML programme, unlike the previous examples, has built a feedback mechanism directly into the course design from the beginning. Learner feedback is encouraged for materials, presentations and peer observations and an internal research team is involved in continuous monitoring of the course. Although the programme is only a few months old, some printed material has already been adapted in light of feedback from learners. Initial and ongoing training is provided for tutors and learner assessment is moderated externally. 

Since only one of the programmes reviewed for this research has a formal system of monitoring built into the programme from day one, it is difficult to ascertain the basis on which the other institutions might adapt their programme offering in future to respond to problems unforeseen in the programme planning or to accommodate changing needs. O’Shea et al (in Mills & Tait, 1996) point out that there are two key processes which inform quality assurance and assessment in distance learning: 

·        The use of feedback for quality enhancement

·        The induction and development of staff to meet quality enhancement goals.

 

They note that computer and communication technologies play a critical role in supporting the management of feedback and development processes. Foks (1996) supports the above position and would add that the quality control process requires continuous monitoring of the service provided to learners, learner performance, and learner progress, and that the design of supporting databases, as well as the overall programme design, should be guided by the ease of making changes and updating.