Concepts
of Quality
Frank Heyworth
What
do we mean by quality?
Try to define “quality”
for yourself.
________ ”Quality is ____________________“
You probably
found it difficult to get a satisfactory general definition which isn’t
circular, such as “quality means good”. But you could certainly be more
specific if you needed to define a quality car or restaurant. This book
is about managing quality in language education, so we need to look at
quality as a specific, operational concept. This means being able (1)
to define “quality in
language education”; (2) to describe it in objective
operational terms; (3) to identify the processes by which good language
education can be produced; (4) to establish procedures for observing it
and assessing it; and (5) to look at the issues involved in accrediting
it.
What do you mean by:
- a good
lesson?
- a good
teacher?
- a successful
course?
- an efficient
school?
- a fulfilling
educational experience?
To do this
involves establishing criteria and setting standards which enable us to
assess all of these in a reliable and principled way.
þDefinitions "criteria"- principles
by which we judge quality (for example, criteria for judging a public
transport system would probably include safety, punctuality and comfort)
"standards" - specific, observable, achievable, measurable targets
for making criteria operational (for example, a transport system could
set a standard for punctuality - 98% of trains, buses etc. will arrive
within 5 minutes of the announced time)
Quality
issues in language education
“ Are we
doing the right things?” and “Are we doing things right?” are key twin
questions in the application of quality procedures in any domain of activity.
In the field
of language education there is a need to have a clear and coherent idea
of what are the “right things” that we are doing, and procedures for checking
that we are “doing things right”. This means that among many issues, the
following must be addressed:
- What criteria can
be applied to the decision-making process to ensure that curricula take
account of relevant factors?
- What are the models
against which the quality of teaching / learning activities are to be
measured?
- What are the processes
by which teaching / learning is planned, organised and delivered?
- How are these models
and processes described and communicated in such a way that those involved
are aware of them and contribute to their definition and development?
- What are the responsibilities
with regard to quality of the different actors - teachers, learners,
administrators, parents etc.- participating in the learning activities?
- What are the procedures
for observing and getting feedback on the teaching / learning
activities?
- What are the procedures
for quality control? Who undertakes it? How can the results of the quality
control be fed back into the planning and delivery processes?
In order
to address issues of this kind we need to examine how quality assurance
and control procedures are typically applied to teaching in general and
to language education in particular, and to compare these with the approaches
commonly used in other fields. This may suggest the application
of different approaches to language learning and teaching activities.
þDefinitions
"Quality assurance" - the procedures and steps
taken by an institution to make sure that it provides products or services
of a high quality
"Quality control" - the procedures used to check and assess
the quality of the products or services.
Quality assurance is always internal to the institution. Quality control
can either be internal or external.
Quality
Assurance and Quality Control in general
The concepts
and methods which are the basis of quality procedures were developed,
mainly in the United States and Japan in industrial environments during
and after the Second World War. The aim was to make production processes
more efficient by reducing faults and errors - one of the watchwords was
“zero tolerance of error” - and to produce goods of consistently high,
and standardised quality. In order to achieve this, a number of procedures
and principles were developed:
- a need to analyse
the function of the finished product and of the constituent parts
- careful design of
the components to do what they were intended to do – in other words,
establishing functional criteria
- clear standards
for the performance of the finished products.
It was realised
that improved quality was not to be achieved through technical progress
alone. Especially in Japan it was emphasised that the responsibility for
the quality of the product should lie with those producing it, not with
outside inspectors, and that people worked best if they formed teams able
to organise their own work flexibly and intelligently. “Quality circles”,
small teams who were encouraged to provide suggestions and to take quality
initiatives were devised as a way of promoting the desired approach and
attitude. It was stressed that correcting mistakes was expensive and time-consuming
and that therefore the aim was to “get it right the first time, every
time”.
The concept
of quality management is also applied to the provision of services as
well as the production of goods. Since these are not tangible in the same
way as goods, the idea of customer satisfaction has been introduced and
quality has been equated with this - slogans such as “quality means meeting
customer expectations” or “quality means exceeding customer expectations”
have been used. In the provision of services the “contract” between the
provider and the consumer of services is a relational one and the quality
of the service is often defined through the keeping of promises which
are expressed in the form of “customer charters” or service guarantees.
For example, a railway promises that if its trains do not arrive within
x minutes or the announced time the customers will have part of their
fare re-imbursed; or a hotel chain will give guarantees about the speed
or range of services provided. An essential element of quality in
services is to establish a clear description of what is offered - “say
what you do / do what you say you do”.
The idea
of “quality” as an important feature of the production of goods and the
provision of services has led to its being an important factor in the
management of companies and other organisations. The procedures are divided
into “quality assurance”, the steps which need to be taken to produce
goods or provide services of high quality; and “quality control”, the
procedures devised to check that the aimed for or promised quality is
achieved. The idea of quality has been introduced into the public domain,
with governments promising specific standards in the provision of health
services or education.
There have
also been attempts to define all working relationships as being influenced
by client satisfaction, with every person in an organisation having clients,
either internal or external, whose needs s/he must satisfy, and providers,
who provide services which enable people to carry out their tasks efficiently.
Various
organisations have been set up to establish standards, either general
or for a particular activity, and to validate that the standards are being
kept. The International Standards Organisation (ISO) has a series of norms
- for example, ISO 9000, which is applied to service industries, including
a range of schools of different kinds. The ISO certification checks that
there are proper procedures for ensuring quality standards and these are consistently applied, but makes no judgement of
the quality of the product or service itself. In an educational context,
it would check that there were procedures for observing and assessing
the quality of the teaching, but it would not make an assessment of the
work in the classroom.
Think of every day transactions and activities you carry out.
What criteria
do you apply to judging good quality and low quality in goods and services?
What
standards do you set?
Quality Assurance and Quality Control in educational
contexts
In state
education the management of quality has not generally been explicit and
it has often been unsystematic. In many countries the responsibility for
quality control has lain with ministry of education inspectors whose jobs
have involved both the inspection of schools and their accreditation;
in some countries they have also inspected individual teachers, grading
them in ways which influenced their salaries and careers. In recent years
the emphasis of inspectors’ work has been more on advising schools and
on promoting good practice than on control and sanctions.
The procedures
for internal quality assurance have varied widely. Typically there has
been relatively little close observation of the teaching activities and
in many environments it has been possible for teachers to work alone in
the classroom for years once they have gone through their probationary
period. In some schools there is provision for observation of classes
by heads of department or for peer observation, but this is far from being
generalised and is more common in private education than in state systems.
In recent
years, nevertheless, there has been increased concern with the need for
schools to be accountable for standards and quality and in a number of
countries schools have been encouraged to produce “school programmes”
- statements of their aims and the means by which they plan to achieve
them. A small number of institutions have obtained the ISO 9001 certificate.
In the field
of private language schools, more concerned with the need to find and
keep students in competition with other schools, there has been considerable
development of inspection schemes to check and accredit good practice.
The British Council administers the English in Britain accreditation system
and has been carrying out inspections for both private and further education
institutions. There are a number of national associations promoting quality
through accreditation, granting “quality labels” for schools; SOUFFLE
for French, CEELE for Spanish, the Hungarian Association of Language Schools,
QUEST for schools in Romania are just a few examples of these initiatives.
EAQUALS (the European Association for Quality Language Services) has an
inspection system based on a code of practice with charters for learners,
staff and for information and has accredited schools in 11 different countries
and for a wide range of languages.
The Application
of Quality Assurance and Quality Control in Language Teaching and Learning
It is in
no way the intention to suggest that quality models from industrial and
commercial contexts can be applied en bloc to educational activities,
nor that achievement of the aims of language teaching can be measured
by a simple criterion of customer satisfaction. Nevertheless, language
education, like most fields of activity, must satisfy the needs of its
“clientele” - learners, parents, employers, society in general in state
education; those who are purchasing language courses in the private sector.
Therefore it is useful to take account of experience outside the language
teaching field and to assess how far it can - or cannot - be usefully
applied.
Who are the “clients” in the educational institutions you work in?
Distinguish between “primary clients” (usually those who pay) and “secondary
clients” (other stakeholders in the educational process).
Language
learning and teaching are complex matters and cannot be reduced to a single,
simplistic model of quality. They are influenced by the personalities
of learners and teachers and by the relationships between them. The content
is also defined by what is happening in the world around them and the
topics they choose to discuss. Nevertheless it is important to aim for
high standards and to set criteria by which the quality of teaching/learning
operations will be judged. Factors which might be taken into account
in setting quality criteria include:
- The basic educational
principles and beliefs underlying school systems.
Is there
a consensus on the aims of language teaching and learning? The Common
European Framework of Reference is an attempt to describe systematically
these aims in the field of language education. . It is deliberately
not prescriptive - “We do NOT set out to tell practitioners what to do,
or how to do it ...”, but at the same time clearly sets out broad principles.
The Framework “ supports methods which help learners build up attitudes,
knowledge and skills they need to become more independent in thought and
action and be more responsible and co-operative in relation to other people".
North, Lasnier,
Morfeld, Borneto & Spàth in the “Quality Guide for the evaluation
and design of language programmes” (A Guide for the Evaluation and Design
of Quality Language learning and teaching Programmes and Materials, European
Commission 2000) etc. propose a number of quality principles, shown in
the table below:
Principles
|
Sub-principles
|
Relevance
|
Learner
centredness
Accountability
Appropriateness
|
Transparency
|
Clarity
of Aims
Clarity about Achievement
Clarity
of Presentation
Clarity of Rationale
|
Reliability
|
Consistency
Internal
Coherence
Methodological Integrity
Linguistic Integrity
Textual Integrity
Practicality
|
Attractiveness
|
User friendliness
Interactivity
Variety
Sensitivity
|
Flexibility
|
Individualisation
Adaptability
|
Generativeness (i.e. does the learning generate further learning
or development?)
|
|
Transferability
Integration
Cognitive development
|
Participation
|
|
Involvement
Personal
Interest
Partnership
|
Efficiency
|
|
Cost effectiveness
Ergonomy
|
Socialisation
|
|
Social skills
Intercultural awareness
|
- A process-oriented
model of the organisation of language teaching / learning
Is there
a clearly stated curriculum with clear level descriptors? Is it applied
with suitable resources? Is there appropriate assessment to place learners
in groups, to evaluate progress and to certify achievement? Are there
systems for observation of teaching and for getting feedback from learners
so that the efficiency of the process can be monitored?
- A client-centred
view of teaching / learning
This
will involve analysis both of the uses to which learners will put the
language they have learnt and of their learning needs and preferences.
It will also analyse other stakeholders in the language education system
- parents, potential employers, the needs of the society etc. The system
will include procedures, such as questionnaires or focus groups, to ascertain
clients’ satisfaction with the learning activities.
- Criteria focussing
on the management of human resources involved in the teaching / learning
process
The achievement
of quality in industrial and service fields Are there proper opportunities
for the training and development of teachers? Are there arrangements for
peer observation and reflection on the teaching process? Are there appropriate
resources available?
- Evaluation of
the results of the teaching / learning activities
Are objectives
set for progress and achievement? Are these objectives attained? Are the
results in public examinations satisfactory?
Institutions
involved in language teaching will need to take factors such as these
into account in order to define the criteria they will apply to assessing
whether they are doing things right and whether they meet the standards
they set for themselves.
What model(s) do you, explicitly
or implicitly, apply to assessing the quality of language education in
your institution?
Is
this model relevant?
|
What
standards do you apply?
|
Customer satisfaction
|
|
Educational principles
|
|
Efficient process management
|
|
Evaluation of results
|
|
Focus
on human resources
|
|
|