Quality Issues by British Council

Quality issues

Studying in the UK offers you the chance to gain internationally recognised qualifications. The quality of UK education in the UK is renowned, but, as in any other country, there are some less reputable operators. This information sheet advises you how to check whether the institution you are considering and the qualifications it offers are recognised or accredited. This ensures that it will meet a minimum, threshold standard for quality. The sheet also gives some advice on how to compare the quality of institutions.

1 English language centres Accreditation UK (www.britishcouncil.org/accreditation.htm) is the accreditation scheme for English language courses. It is run by the British Council in partnership with English UK (www.englishuk.com), which is the national association of accredited English language centres. There are over 430 accredited English language centres in private schools, educational trusts and charities, further education colleges and universities. Language centres within institutions are also subject to the quality assurance regime relevant to the type of institution. Accredited courses are inspected every four years, but there is also a requirement for annual reporting. A team of independent inspectors check four standards: •

Management standard – whether the management of the teaching and course provision operates to the benefit of its students, in accordance with what it promises in its publicity.

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Resources and environment standard – whether the learning resources and environment will support and enhance the studies of students, and offer an appropriate professional environment for staff.

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Teaching and learning standard – whether teachers have appropriate qualifications and are given sufficient support to ensure that their teaching meets the needs of their students.

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Welfare and student services standard – whether the needs of students for security, pastoral care, information, accommodation and leisure activities are met.

Checklist: assessing an English language centre •

Check the Accreditation UK website to see if it is accredited. An up-to-date list of over 430 accredited centres can be accessed at www.britishcouncil.org/accreditation-az-list.htm. You might like to ask the school to see a summary of the latest inspection report.

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If it is not accredited by the British Council, it is probably better to choose one that is accredited in a similar area or with similar characteristics.

Quality issues

www.educationuk.org

2 Independent schools Over half a million children, eight per cent of the UK school population, attend private schools. The majority of these (80 per cent) go to 1,280 schools that are members of the Independent Schools Council (ISC). The Independent Schools Inspectorate (ISI), part of ISC, has primary responsibility for inspecting member schools. Accreditation by ISI is a condition of ISC membership. England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland have separate inspectorates, which operate in broadly similar ways. The Office for Standards in Education, Children's Services and Skills (Ofsted), and its equivalents in the other parts of the UK, monitor ISC inspections rather than carry out any separate inspections. Ofsted also inspects private schools that are not members of ISC. The Education Act 2002 requires that all independent schools must be registered with the Department for Children, Schools and Families (DCSF). Applications for registration by new schools must be made before a school begins to operate and admit pupils. All independent schools must satisfy the following range of standards as a condition of registration. •

the quality of education provided

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the spiritual, moral, social and cultural development of pupils

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the welfare, health and safety of pupils

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the suitability of proprietors and staff

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the premises and accommodation

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the provision of information and the way in which complaints are handled.

These standards are examined before an application for school registration is approved and thereafter during the regular six-yearly cycle of inspections to ensure they continue to meet the standards for registration. Ofsted notes that, overall, schools in ISC perform substantially better than schools outside its membership.

Checklist: assessing an independent school •

Check the Independent Schools Council website (www.isc.co.uk/SchoolSearch_FindanISCSchool.htm) to see if it is a member. This will give you some basic information about the school. You might also wish to take a look at the latest inspection report.

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If it is not a member, be careful. Look at the website addresses in the ‘Further education colleges’ section of this leaflet.

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Look at its performance in public examinations at www.dcsf.gov.uk/performancetables, although less information is generally available than for state schools.

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You can look at a school’s comparative performance in newspaper league tables. For example, at www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/education/school_league_tables.

For more information refer to Choosing your boarding school or college in this series.

Quality issues

www.educationuk.org

3 Independent sixth-form and tutorial colleges Instead of staying on at school at the end of year 11 (age 16), some students choose to move to an independent college. These institutions accept students aged 16+ and, like school sixth forms, provide a bridge between school and university. Independent colleges are regularly inspected and accredited, either by the British Accreditation Council for Independent Further and Higher Education (BAC) or the ISC (described in the previous section). A full list of BAC-accredited colleges can be found at www.the-bac.org. BAC inspectors are aware of the needs of international students, such as English language support and advice on living in the UK. Independent colleges are also inspected by the UK government. Tutorial colleges are not inspected by the government. They may seek accreditation from the Accreditation Service for International Colleges (ASIC). They can choose to join the Council for Independent Further and Higher Education (CIFE). CIFE colleges are inspected and accredited by the British Accreditation Council for Independent Further and Higher Education (BAC). There will be changes to this system in 2009, which will require all places of education for international students to become registered and accredited; updates will be published on the Border and Immigration agency website (www.bia.homeoffice.gov.uk). Two membership organisations represent the independent sixth form and tutorial college sector. The BAC-Accredited Colleges Association was established in July 2007 to serve as a voice for some 250 private and independent colleges but does not yet have an organisational structure or website. Twelve independent colleges who specialise in getting their students into good universities are members of the Council for Independent Further Education (CIFE: www.cife.org.uk ) who maintains a code of good practice for members.

Checklist: assessing an independent sixth form or tutorial college •

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Check to see if it is accredited by BAC (www.the-bac.org/colleges/directory/index.html). This website gives you limited details about the college compared with the ISC site, but does give you a hyperlink to its website. You might wish to ask to see a summary of its latest inspection report.

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If it is not accredited by either organisation be careful, although it will have been inspected by government. At the very least, ask to see a summary of its latest inspection report.

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Check to see if a tutorial college has accreditation from the Accreditation Service for International Colleges (ASIC) (www.asic.org.uk/collegeinfo.htm) or the British Accreditation Council for Independent Further and Higher Education (BAC) www.the-bac.org

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Look at the performance in public examinations at www.dcsf.gov.uk/performancetables. This type of college is not included in newspaper league tables.

4 Further education colleges These are state sector colleges that offer a range of levels and types of training and education. They are inspected or quality assured by different bodies according to the courses they offer. Their activities at pre-higher education level are inspected by the relevant government departments. These inspection reports can be accessed at: England: www.ofsted.gov.uk/reports Wales: www.estyn.gov.uk/inspection_reports_index/further_education_institutions.asp Scotland: www.hmie.gov.uk/SelectEstablishment.aspx?typeid=4 Northern Ireland www.denidata.nics.gov.uk/appInspRptsSearch/IRMain.aspx.

Quality issues

www.educationuk.org

5 Universities and colleges offering higher education qualifications Five levels of higher education qualifications are recognised in the Higher Education Qualifications Framework (www.qaa.ac.uk/academicinfrastructure/FHEQ/EWNI/default.asp for England, Wales and Northern Ireland, www.qaa.ac.uk/academicinfrastructure/FHEQ/SCQF/default.asp for Scotland). These frameworks state the outcomes that a student should be able to demonstrate for the award of the qualification. They also state the wider abilities that the typical student could be expected to have developed. The frameworks are complemented by a series of Bachelors degree subject benchmark statements which define what can be expected of a graduate in terms of the abilities and skills needed to develop understanding or competence in the subject. These can be accessed at www.qaa.ac.uk/academicinfrastructure/benchmark/default.asp. A foundation degree, which can now be awarded by a further education college, is level 2. A Bachelor’s degree with honours can be awarded only by a higher education institution (HEI) that has degree-awarding powers. These are known as ‘recognised bodies’. A warning about bogus degrees is published on the Department for Innovation, Universities and Skills website (www.dius.gov.uk). Many institutions that do not have the authority to award their own degrees may provide courses that lead to a degree of a recognised body. These institutions are called ‘listed bodies’. Recognised and listed bodies are available at: www.dfes.gov.uk/recognisedukdegrees/.

How is quality assured? Each institution is responsible for the standards and quality of its programmes. The Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education (QAA) is an independent body responsible for safeguarding the public interest in sound standards of higher education qualifications, and encouraging continual improvement in the management of its quality. Institutional audits are held at regular intervals (normally every six years in England) to ensure that institutions are providing higher education, awards and qualifications of an acceptable quality and at an appropriate academic standard. The audit also checks that higher education institutions (HEIs) are exercising their legal powers to award degrees in a proper manner. A judgment is made on whether the QAA has confidence, limited confidence or no confidence in the standards and quality of an HEI’s management of its standards and quality; and on the accuracy, integrity, completeness and frankness of the information that it publishes. There are processes in place to ensure that HEIs in which the QAA has limited or no confidence improve their management systems to restore confidence. The ultimate penalty if they do not succeed in this would be the withdrawal of their public funding but this has not happened at an institutional level. The QAA prior to 2002 carried out subject reviews of individual departments to assess their standards and quality. These reviews are now very out of date and you should disregard them if you find copies; since universities will have taken steps to address weaknesses that the review process revealed. However, many departments are accredited by professional bodies, that both guide the curriculum and carry out review visits. If you are considering studying for a degree which in part meets the requirements of a professional qualification, you should speak to the equivalent professional body in your country to discover whether it accepts UK qualifications.

Quality issues

www.educationuk.org

Choosing a university or college There is no shortcut to choosing the right degree programme for you. Many factors are involved in your personal decision, and what is right for one person might be totally wrong for a second person. The British Council can guide you through the information sources but cannot tell you that one university is better than another. A university or department’s ranking might influence your decision, although universities with a high demand for places will have higher entry qualifications. There is no official ranking of UK universities unlike in some countries. There are three sources of information, however, that you may wish to consult. These are:

Newspaper ‘league tables’ These are unofficial rankings that are compiled from a variety of official and university sources. They have to be used with a great deal of caution, first because they bring together information from different sources and combine it to produce an overall score, and second because they determine what criteria to use and what ‘weighting’ to give each variable. Universities do not differ much in their quality from year to year, but they can significantly move up and down league tables because the methodology used by the newspapers has changed. This does not stop newspaper headlines such as ‘Cambridge overtakes Oxford as leading UK university.’ Where these league tables are useful is in making a great deal of relevant information available in a single place. In many ways, they are best used to compare universities on individual variables that concern you (for example, staff to student ratio, facilities and services expenditure) rather than using them as a source of overall ranking. It is not for the British Council to recommend a best ‘table’. Many people use The Times Good University Guide, www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/education/good_university_guide, which is also published annually as a book. This ranks departments in many subjects as well as universities. A web search engine will enable you to access more newspaper websites.

National Student Survey This survey of undergraduate student satisfaction with their learning and teaching was introduced in 2005. Final year students are requested each year to complete a questionnaire that asks them to express their overall satisfaction with the quality of their course on a five point scale that judges teaching; assessment and feedback; academic support; organisation and management; learning resources and personal development. Results are listed by department and university. Results are reported on a website (www.unistats.com) which enables you to compare directly the satisfaction scores of departments, along with other factors such as entry requirements, employability and awards by degree class, for up to three universities at a time.

Research Assessment Exercise A Research Assessment Exercise (RAE) is carried out periodically by UK research funding councils to guide their funding. It is peer-review based; departments have the option of which members of the academic staff they submit for assessment. The results are reported for each university by unit of assessment,on a 7-point scale from 1 to 5* (the highest) according to how much of a department’s work is judged to reach national or international levels of excellence. These results can be found at www.rae.ac.uk. Make sure that you look at the proportion of staff submitted to help you evaluate the true quality of a department. Obviously the higher proportion of staff that is submitted, the harder it is to obtain a high grade. Highly rated research departments receive a lot more money for research, and although teaching and research are separate funding streams, it tends to filter down in various ways to the quality of the undergraduate learning environment. Perhaps more importantly, a university’s status and reputation reflects the quality of its research. A graduate from a top research university will always find it easier to gain employment than one from a weaker research university, unfair as this may be to the quality of teaching in the latter. The official results do not rank universities by the overall quality of their research, but newspaper league tables reduce the complexity to a single score. A new RAE is currently taking place, and the results will be published on 18 December 2008. The 7-point scale has been replaced with a 5-point grading system, ranging from ‘Ungraded’ (UG) up to a maximum of ‘4’. Quality profiles are used to give a more rounded picture of the quality of research undertaken by a HEI. The 2008 results will be accessible on the RAE website at www.rae.ac.uk.

Quality issues

www.educationuk.org

Checklist: choosing a university •

Decide what you are looking for in terms of approach to a subject, potential to combine subjects, size, location and other factors that are important to you and consult various prospectuses.

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Look at the Unistats website (www.unistats.com), particularly for student satisfaction with your shortlisted departments.

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Look at their score in the 2001 RAE (www.rae.ac.uk) remembering to look at the proportion of staff submitted as well as the score. Remember it is seven years old and might not accurately reflect the present quality.

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Consult university league tables if you feel they may add to your knowledge.

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Talk to as many people who have studied there as you can. The university should be able to put you in touch with alumni who are prepared to talk with potential students.

6 Studying for a UK qualification in your own country How is quality assured? Universities UK universities are increasingly partnering with institutions abroad to deliver degree programmes in-country. Equally, the advances in information and communications technology (ICT) have led to a considerable growth in flexible and distance learning that generally do not require the student to attend particular classes or events at particular times and particular locations. E-learning is frequently a major component of these programmes. However, the Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education (QAA) is responsible for assuring the quality of education offered by UK institutions wherever and however it is delivered. It has developed a Code of Practice containing guidelines which it would recommend universities adopt for this type of provision. (www.qaa.ac.uk/academicinfrastructure/codeOfPractice/section2/default.asp).

Private colleges and other providers The Open and Distance Learning Quality Council (ODLQC) is an officially recognised UK organisation that accredits open and distance learning providers (www.odlqc.org.uk). The ODLQC does not accredit programmers, so you will also need to ensure that the qualification or programme of study is recognised within the National Qualifications Framework, which is regulated by the Office of the Qualifications and Examinations Regulator (OFQUAL) (www.ofqual.gov.uk). For some subjects, institutions will also seek accreditation from specialist international bodies. For example, there are three international accrediting bodies for business schools. These are: AMBA – the Association of MBAs, based in the UK; EQUIS – the quality assurance scheme run by the European Foundation for Management Development and based in Brussels; and AACSB – the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business, based in the USA.

Quality issues

www.educationuk.org

Checklist: assessing courses provided jointly by UK and overseas institutions and distance learning programmes •

Is the qualification offered by a UK university with the power to award degrees?

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For other providers, check if the course is accredited by ODLQC (www.odlqc.org.uk) and that the qualifications are part of the National Qualifications Framework.

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What is the status and reputation of the local partner institution (where applicable)?

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Will the qualification be recognised in your own country? Your local British Council office can often help you with this.

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Look at the learning support available to you.

For more information, refer to the Distance learning sheets in this series.

Where can I find more information?

The British Council has produced the Education UK portfolio to provide international students with a wide range of information and guidance that will help them find out more about studying a UK course and other important issues, such as applying to study, entry clearance and living in the UK. The portfolio includes: • • • • •

The Education UK website and a number of country websites containing locally relevant information – www.educationuk.org Your guide to: UK Undergraduate and pre-university*; Postgraduate and MBA* Your guide to: UK universities, colleges and schools handbook* Club UK magazine,* also available online at www.educationuk.org/clubuk Postgraduate UK magazine.*

The publications are available at a selected number of British Council offices for students to use. The Education UK websites are a valuable source of information, with a database of over 450,000 courses and profiles of institutions that contain details of entry requirements and course fees; and some offer a virtual tour of their campus.

Quality issues

www.educationuk.org

Accreditation Unit British Council Bridgewater House 58 Whitworth Street Manchester M1 6BB Telephone +44 (0)16 1957 7692 Fax +44 (0)16 1957 7074 E-mail accreditation.unit@britishcouncil.org www.britishcouncil.org/accreditation Independent Schools Council Information Service (ISCis) Grosvenor Gardens House 35â&#x20AC;&#x201C;37 Grosvenor Gardens London SW1W 0BS Telephone +44 (0)20 7798 1500 Fax +44 (0)20 7798 1501 E-mail info@iscis.uk.net www.isc.co.uk

English UK 219 St John Street London EC1V 4LY Telephone +44 (0)20 7608 7960 Fax +44 (0)20 7608 7961 E-mail info@englishuk.com www.englishuk.com

Independent Schools Inspectorate 11th Floor Northway House 1379 High Road Whetstone London N20 9LP Telephone +44 (0)20 8445 6262 Fax +44 (0)20 8445 7272 E-mail info@isinspect.org.uk www.isi.net/

Scottish Executive Education Department Victoria Quay Edinburgh EH6 6QQ

National Assembly for Wales (NATED) Cardiff Bay Cardiff CF99 1NA

Telephone +44 (0)13 1556 8400 or +44 (0)84 5774 1741 Fax +44 (0) 131 244 8240 E-mail ceu@scotland.gov.uk www.scotland.gov.uk/Topics/Education

Telephone +44 (0)29 2082 5111 E-mail DELLSWebTeam@wales.gsi.gov.uk. new.wales.gov.uk/topics/educationandskills/?lang=en

British Accreditation Council for Independent Further and Higher Education (BAC) 44 Bedford Row London WC1R 4LL

Department for Children, Schools and Families (DCFS) Sanctuary Buildings Great Smith Street London SW1P 3BT

Telephone +44 (0)20 7447 2584 Fax +44 (0)20 7447 2585 E-mail info@the-bac.org www.the-bac.org

Open and Distance Learning Quality Council (ODLQC) 16 Park Crescent London W1B 1AH Telephone +44 (0)20 7612 7090 Fax +44 (0)20 7612 7092 E-mail info@odqlc.org.uk

Telephone +44 (0)87 0000 2288 Fax +44 (0)19 2879 4248 E-mail info@dcsf.gsi.gov.uk www.dfes.gov.uk Quality Assurance Agency (QAA) Southgate House Southgate Street Gloucester GL1 1UB Telephone +44 (0)14 5255 7000 Fax +44 (0)14 5255 7070 E-mail comms@qaa.ac.uk www.qaa.ac.uk

www.ogldc.org.uk

Quality issues

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Scottish Qualifications Authority (SQA) 24 Douglas Street Glasgow G2 7NQ Telephone +44 (0)84 5279 1000 Fax +44 (0)14 1242 2244 E-mail customer@sqa.org.uk www.sqa.org.uk

Department for Innovation, Universities and Skills (DIUS) Kingsgate House, 66-74 Victoria Street, London SW1E 6SW Telephone +44 (0)20 7215 5555 E-mail info@dius.gsi.gov.uk www.dius.gov.uk

The Council for Independent Further Education (CIFE) Executive Secretary 1 Knightsbridge Green London SW1X 7NW Telephone +44 (0)20 8767 8666 E-mail enquiries@cife.org.uk www.cife.org.uk Accreditation Service for International Colleges (ASIC) Laburnum House Drovers Lane Redmarshall Stockton-on-tees TS21 1EL Telephone +44 (0)17 4063 0956 Fax +44 (0)17 4063 0956 E-mail info@asic.co.uk www.asic.org.uk

Office of the Qualifications and Examinations Regulator (OFQUAL) Spring Place Coventry Business Park Herald Avenue Coventry CV5 6UB Telephone +44 (0)30 0303 3348 Fax +44 (0)30 0303 3348 E-mail info@ofqual.gov.uk www.ofqual.gov.uk

While every effort has been made to ensure that the information given here is correct and up to date, the British Council accepts no legal liability for its accuracy, currency or completeness.

March 2008

ÂŠ British Council 2008 The United Kingdom's international organisation for cultural relations and educational opportunities. A registered charity: 209131 (England and Wales) SC037733 (Scotland).