By Gizelle McIntyre
The vision of the Quality Council for Trades and Occupations (QCTO) is to
provide an occupational qualifications system that is responsive to labour market
skills needs and results in a skilled, productive and employable workforce. But is
this vision being achieved?
The QCTO is one of three quality councils that ensure the quality and
standards of education and training in South Africa-Umalusi is responsible for
institutions reporting to the Department of Basic Education and the Council for
Higher Education is responsible for quality at institutions of higher learning.
QCTO is responsible for defining the labour related needs into qualifications and
the quality assurance of occupational qualifications, including workplace
training.Training providers will have to showthat training is registered, quality-
assured and offered with clear quality assurance to show that they are a
reputable service provider.
Getting to a new qualification starts with a pre-scoping meeting held with
mostly employers and a few Learning and Development (LandD) specialists to ensure
that the qualification is needed in the industry. Ascoping session is facilitated by
the QCTOand the relevant SETA or SETAs involve as manyrelevant stakeholders
as possible.
It is a prerequisite that the entire industry is represented at the meeting
andthe object of the pre-scoping meeting is to determine whether the
proposedvocational/occupational qualification is one that employers are in need
of. Once consensus has been reached, a scoping meeting with stakeholders and
potential development quality partners will be held. The full process then
commences.
One can apply to be a workplace provider or a training provider, or both.When a
training provider decides on what it wants to provide,it has to apply to the
appointed Assessment Quality Partner (AQP) for that particular qualification.The
AQP is the quality control arm appointed by the QCTO and will provide most of
the functions currently handled by the SETAs.
The true effectiveness of this will only be visible once the QCTO processes are
well under way. It is however necessary to acknowledge that the baby has not
been thrown out with the bathwater. Skills Development providers and
Assessment Centres will be accredited through the QCTO.
Qualifications that are currently accredited have been re-registered and will
be maintained until the last achievement date on the qualification, unless there
is a radical need to treat these qualifications in a different manner. SETAs have
been mandated by the QCTO to quality assure this. An employer will have the
option of going the current route, or to make use of a provider using of the
QCTO system with the quality assurance operational leg as the AQP.
The AQP will conduct the summative integrated assessments while training
providers will handle formative assessments.Workplace providers will do the
workplace assessments which must be done formally and this has an effect on
the coaching, mentoring and workplace assessments currently being undertaken
in the workplace.
It is critical to understand that middle management, or supervisors, must start
using clever assessment tools that incorporate the everyday functions in line
with performance assessment. This is a specialised job performed by
assessment designers. The workplace assessments component is a make-or-
break situation with regards to achieving access to the final summative
assessment and is thus imperative that a workplace provider designs and
implements this component effectively.
Professional Bodies and Associations (at times in collaboration with SETAs) are
being encouraged to become part of the AQPs for the various designations they
have registered, provided they have a national footprint, a good track record
and implementation ability.
The relationship between the SETAs and QCTO will continue, with QCTO
handling quality control up to level eight vocational qualifications. Level nine and
10 will solely be the responsibility of the Council for Higher Education as these
are considered purely academic in nature. QCTO qualifications and Skills
Programmes (Vocational Awards) have to be demand led, in other words the
market must be able to employ those with the qualification.
Other principles are responsiveness, qualifications being fit for purpose,
relevant, expert driven and show involvement of practitioners and professional
bodies. Occupational competence must include work experience, standardised
summative assessments, be externally moderated and be developed by
practitioners.
The revised policy of the National Qualifications Framework (NQF) recognises
that there are different forms of learning and that each requires a different
delivery and assessment approach. Each employer will have an AQP
incorporating knowledge and practical skills. The workplace provider is mandated
to assess whether learners are gaining workplace experience and can
implement Recognition of Prior Learning (RPL). This will hopefully also increase
the trust employers place in the system and allow for more successful
recruitment in the future.
There is a national call for sector cooperation and for private organisations to
get involved in the LandD processes and Quality Assurance, especially in ensuring
that all learning offered is fit for purpose.As assessment procedures will
intensify, LandD professionals will have to focus on continuous improvement and
stay abreast of changes in assessment requirements. This also means that this
profession should be seen as a critical skill within each and every company.
Although many may believe this is just more of the same, it is critical to
acknowledge that we have come a long way since 2000, and that although the
system may not be perfect, if we keep working on it we get closer to that elusive
goal all the time.
