“Making Education Responsive to Prior Learning”
Keynote Address prepared for the 29th EUCEN Conference
“From Bologna to Bergen and Beyond”
Ms Rachel C. Prinsloo
April 28-30, 2005
Univ ersity of South Africa, Pretoria, 0002; South Africa
Private Bag X6, Florida l7l0, South Africa
Telephone: +27 ll 47l 3938; Fax: +27 1l 47 3476; E-mail: rprinslo@tsa.ac.za
Visit our website at http://www.unisa.ac.za
Preamble
Introduction
• Acknowledgement of the context setting
value of the Feutrie, Davies and Dondi
position papers
• Provide a policy and developmental
trajectory of key events in Bologna
Process
• Serve as advocacy templates, EUCEN
institutional memory and account
Interpreting my brief
• Deceptively simple task of providing an
“outsiders” perspective to the debates
• Admit to temptation to simply respond and
answer thoughtful and provocative position
frameworks
• Engage in dialogical and interactive
approach
Structure of the Keynote Address
• Propose to explore 4 dimensions
(i) Locate the notion of “education” in
contemporary debates of “end of
knowledge” in higher education through
framing “education” as the knowledge
brokerage and knowledge production
function of universities explicitly in the
service of the public good
Structure of the Keynote Address cont.
• (ii) Examine the tactical value of QF’s
underpinned by quality regimes as an
instrument to promote alignment,
articulation, comparability and portability.
Use UNISA as a case study to illuminate
silences and gaps in the EU processes
• (iii) Engage with the emerging findings of a
recent CHE study on Equity and Access
for Adults and Workers
Structure of the Keynote Address cont
• (iv) Conclude by distilling common
challenges
Using a “Bergen now” and “Beyond” lens
to envision the future and identify strategic
pitfalls from the analysis
Offer tentative recommendations as a
humble contribution to the dialogue and
conference outcomes
Contemporary Challenges
• Singh (2003) argues for a new social
embeddedness of universities through
constructive enagement in 4 spheres:
renegotiating aims, purposes and
priorities;relating teaching and learning to
the wider world; dialogical interaction
between scientists and practitioners;
assuming responsibilities as neighbours
and citizens
Kwiek (200l, p.27) argues that
• “policy for the coming decade cannot
be fashioned successfully by finetuning policies that are currently in
place: policy makers need an entirely
new conceptual approach to policy
frameworks”, especially with regard to
the impact of globalisation on higher
education.
Sehoole(2004) provides a balanced account
of of the impact of global challenges citing
as examples
rapid explosion of new and specialist fields,
arrival of private providers, corporate
universities and growing in-house
R & D activities in the business sector
Barnett’s (2000) alternative to “end of
knowledge” and legitimacy crisis
•
Suggests 4 elements to reposition
education
(i) Capacity for innovative and revolutionary
accounts of contemporary life
(ii) New discourses and new technologies
(iii) New forms of professional life
(iv) Process of constructive engagement and
critical reflection – Michel’s challenge to
become learning organisations
Africa’s Response to Globalising
Environment
• Transformation of OAU and alignment of southsouth bloc
• Establishment of AU led by SA and Nigeria
• The South African Higher Education System, the
education and training landscape, is being reengineered to finally disrupt the ideological and
geo-political imagination of the apartheid social
engineers, by creating an integrated system that
is premised on equity, consistency and quality,
dissolving the racialised inequalities of the past.
• The transformation project also intends to
reposition the higher education system within
the competitive and globalised economy.
Effects of Academic Entrepreneurship on
The SA HE Landscape
• l990’s saw explosion of private providers
• 45 formally registered by DoE out of potential 323
• More contentiously – GATS challenge by 5 countries for
SA to remove “burdensome requirements” for access to
educational trade
• Response- vehement assertion by Min of Ed of right to
protect public good and affirm need for state intervention
and protectionism
• No accident that the SA CHE ED Mala Singh will lead
the OECD/ UNESCO Cross Border Ed Provision QA
exercise
Qualification Frameworks and the Creation
of Comprehensive Institutions
• The South African government’s intention
in introducing the new institutional type,
the comprehensive, was informed by the
fact that such a type would be well placed
to address a range of policy goals central
to the national human resource
development strategy
Policy Intentions
Facilitating access to higher education and
the promotion of student mobility through
enhanced articulation between careerfocussed and general academic
programmes; strengthening applied
research, and improved responsiveness to
regional and national human resource,
skills and knowledge needs are stipulated
as key advantages.
The SA HE Policy and Regulatory
Environment - Triangulated Planning and QA
Levers
Ad
vis
or
y
Ro
le
DoE (1997)
PQM / NAP
Policy & Leg.
Public Good
Funding
CHE / HEQC Instit
Audits
Prog
Accred / Capacity
Building 2000 +
HEI’s
and
New
UNISA
ETQA
SAQA Act 1995
NQF
Architecture &
OBE
Quality
Regulation for
ETD
Responsibilities of SAQA (l995)
• create an integrated national framework for learning
achievements
• facilitate access to, and mobility and progression within,
education, training and career pathways
• enhance the quality of education and training
• accelerate the redress of past unfair discrimination in
education, training and employment opportunities
• and thereby contribute to the full personal development
of each learner aimed, in part, at achieving the relevant
NQF objectives relating to and the social and economic
development of the nation at large.
• RPL is access, redress, portability, mobility and
progression within the NQF
• The SAQA Act states that “[a] qualification may be
achieved in whole or in part through recognition of prior
learning, which concept includes but is not limited to
learning outcomes achieved through formal, informal and
non-formal learning and work experience” (1995: 9).
Draft HEQF – policy trajectory outcome
•
Basis for integrating all qualifications into the NQF and its structures
for standards generation and quality assurance
•
Improves coherence of the higher education system & facilitates
articulation of qualifications enhancing the flexibility of the system
•
Enabling student portability in pursuit of their academic or
professional careers
•
New HEQF establishes common parameters and criteria for
qualifications design and facilitates the comparability of qualifications
across the system. Diversity and innovation are encouraged.
•
Higher education institutions will have ample scope to design
educational offerings to realise their different visions, missions and
plans and to meet the varying needs of the clients and communities
they serve.
The UNISA QF
• Regulatory frameworks, common
guiding principles and critical capacity
building for implementation
• HEQC’s Improving T & L Resources
• NADEOSA’S Provider Readiness QA
Instrument for online delivery
http://nadeosa.org.za
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Evaluative Question 3: Academic Demands & Relevance / Suggested Good Practice
Descriptors
Student need
The programme’s design, volume of credits, expected completion time and delivery methods are
based on a detailed profile analysis of its target students..
The programme offers a degree of curriculum choice and flexibility and is delivered via an
appropriate media and technology mix.
Disciplinary and occupational demands
The programme offers students a sound disciplinary knowledge base and sufficient theoretical
and conceptual depth taught at the appropriate level to serve its educational purpose.
There is evidence that the content and theory taught on the programme are current and up-to-date
with recent developments in the discipline/ field. Evidence that, where appropriate, staff members’
research activities contribute to the depth and rigour of the programme’s offerings.
Contextualisation
Where appropriate, the programme offers opportunities for the contextualisation of the knowledge
and skills learnt. Contextualisation is achieved by using appropriate teaching methods, for
example, through work-site placements, service learning, community service, project work and
South African/ African perspectives in the curriculum.
Requirements of external stakeholders
The programme’s design meets the requirements of legitimate external stakeholders such as
professional bodies and potential employers and undertakes a scientific and academic
interpretation of expressed industry needs and identified competences.
Marketable qualifications
Where appropriate, evidence of the programme’s marketability and credibility in the labour market
can be shown.
Research competence
Where appropriate, the programme offers opportunities for students to develop research
competence.
CHE Equity & Access Adults and Workers Study
White Paper 3 – A Programme for Higher Education
Transformation (DoE 1997: 2.2) highlights the need for
“broadening of the social base of the higher education
system” by increasing access to higher education of
“workers and professionals in pursuit of multi-skilling and
re-skilling, and adult learners who were denied access in
the past.”
• Successful policy must overcome historically determined
patterns of fragmentation, inequality and inefficiency. It
must increase access for black, women, disabled and
mature students, and generate new curricula and flexible
models of learning and teaching, including modes of
delivery, to accommodate a larger and more diverse
student population. (1997: 1.13).
Contestation: LLL and Widening
Participation
• Assimilationist model or
• Institutional transformation and
responsiveness??
• Tracking and monitoring mechanisms
• Proving active student status
• Identification of “at risk” students and
timeous interventions
Distillation of Emerging Challenges for South
Africa and The European Context
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“Bergen Now”
Qualifications Frameworks and the
Recognition of Prior Learning
Retaining the full spectrum of programmes
and qualifications in the proposed European
Qualifications Framework
Accreditation Frameworks, Common
Principles and Mutual Recognition of
Decisions
Ensuring fully participatory, inclusive,
transparent and democratic engagement
“Beyond Bergen”
• Directions for Further Development to
achieve the 20l0 EHEA Goals
• International Higher Education and a
Response to the Globalising Arena
• Revisiting The Magna Charta
Universitatum to Reposition the EHEA
more Strategically
I thank you