The Council hosted a number of workshops in its efforts to offered continued development for the island’s tertiary educational providers.
Programme Accreditation Workshop
This workshop attracted over 25 participants from various tertiary educational providers around the island. This flagship workshop offered providers the tools for making the accreditation process as efficient as possible and provided tips for facilitating programme accreditation.
Ms Yvonne Walkes, Chairman of the Council delivered the Opening Remarks. She declared that, “The concept of “Quality” is increasingly becoming a buzz word in Barbados given the need to provide excellence in service at the national level particularly in key economic sectors such as health, financial, tourism and hospitality.” Ms Walkes went on to highlight how education fits into the concept of quality, “Tertiary education and training must be no exception when it comes to expecting quality provision. Similarly to the other key sectors, the focus must be on the customer who has come to expect that the product or service will meet or exceed his/her satisfaction.”
The Chairman pointed out that programme accreditation is different from institutional accreditation. It is especially necessary for specialized areas of study.
Customized Workshop
Staff members of the Barbados Community College, Erdiston Teachers College and Samuel Jackman Prescod Polytechnic participated in a customized Registration workshop hosted by the Council.
Mrs Cecile Humphrey, Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Education, Science, Technology and Innovation delivered the Opening Remarks. Mrs Humphrey expressed that the Ministry was pleased to see that the participating providers were ready to take the necessary steps towards registration by the Barbados Accreditation Council by the end of 2014.
Programme Approval Workshop
This workshop attracted approximately twenty participants from various tertiary educational providers.
Mr Kenneth Walters, Deputy Chairman of the Council delivered the Opening Remarks. He commended the participants for recognizing their role and responsibility as education and training providers in the internal (cont’d on page 7)quality management processes of their respective institutions.
The Deputy Chairman remarked, “By being proactive, and attending this technical workshop before you formally apply for programme approval, your participation will first of all increase your awareness of the programme approval process and your knowledge of the programme approval specifications. Secondly, you will gain the competence needed to enhance the quality of your programme offerings in particular, and improve the quality of educational provisions in Barbados in general. Furthermore, you will gain greater insight into the creative and innovative aspects of programme design which will undoubtedly serve your agencies well in the future. “
Mr Walters applauded the providers for displaying their willingness to be competitive with not only other local providers, but also providers in the global educational environment who not only make programmes available locally, but to whom some of their (local providers) graduates may take their awards at the conclusion of programmes of study for the purpose of gaining access to further studies.
Programme Approval is a quality assurance process that ensures that a programme is appropriately designed and structured; that adequate resources (human, financial, physical) are available; that the programme is consistent with the provider’s mission; and that the programme has stated learning outcomes and assessment strategies that are set at an appropriate level for the qualification awarded.
In 2014, the Council will continue to provide innovative and developmental workshops for tertiary providers.
