This chapter explains the quality assurance systems in place in early childhood and school education, higher education, and adult education and training.

This article provides an overview of the quality assurance systems in place in Northern Ireland at central and institutional level. It describes the situation when the devolved government of Northern Ireland, the Northern Ireland Executive, is in operation.

Central level 

Statutory committees of the Northern Ireland Assembly provide an important means of scrutinising policy at central level.

• The Committee for Education advises and assists the Minister of Education, undertaking a scrutiny, policy development and consultation role with respect to the Department of Education (DE), and playing a key role in the development and consideration of legislation.
• The Committee for the Economy plays a similar role with respect to the Minister for the Economy and the Department for the Economy (DfE) (responsible for higher education, and further education and work-based learning), while the Committee for Health has this role in respect of the Minister for Health and the Department of Health (responsible for childcare).

Statutory committees are established by Section 29 and 29A of the Northern Ireland Act 1998.

The Northern Ireland Audit Office (NIAO) supports the Northern Ireland Assembly in its task of holding the Executive to account for the way in which it spends public money. It is responsible for the financial audit of central government bodies, including government departments.

For schools, the Department of Education (DE) is responsible for setting the overall framework for quality assurance, including the inspection framework, and for compiling data on school performance in order to raise standards and hold schools to account.

The Department for the Economy (DfE), meanwhile, is responsible for the strategic development of further education, including improving the quality of provision and enhancing standards of performance. It also has a statutory responsibility to make provision for the assessment of the quality of the higher education provision that it funds.

The Education and Training Inspectorate (ETI) plays a role in system-level quality assurance. It reports on the effectiveness of educational policy and provides advice to the Department of Education and the Department for the Economy to support policy development, including change to existing policy. The Chief Inspector’s biennial report contributes to this aim by providing a summary of the strengths and weaknesses of the system.

International perspectives 

Information from international surveys of student attainment provides comparative performance measures for school education. Northern Ireland participates in PISA (Programme for International Student Assessment), PIRLS (Progress in International Reading Literacy Study), and TIMSS (Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study). See the Department of Education’s international research page for further information.

In 2013, the OECD conducted a review of school evaluation and student assessment systems in Northern Ireland. The review report, published in December 2013, found that Northern Ireland’s system for school evaluation was well developed. The approach to school self-evaluation and the fact that this is examined as part of the inspection process was identified as a strength. Other strengths included the breadth of the inspection framework, which covers not only outputs and teaching and learning processes, but also the quality of provision for learning, pastoral care and leadership and management.

Institutional level 

The education system in Northern Ireland operates within a strong framework of accountability to students, parents, and the community, and to the Department of Education and the Department for the Economy. Institutional self-evaluation is both an important part of the quality improvement process and a key input to external evaluation. Publicly funded pre-schools, schools, further education (FE) colleges and universities are accountable for their own performance to their boards of governors which include representatives of key stakeholders, such as, in the case of schools, parents, staff and representatives of the local community. External inspection also plays an important role.

Early childhood education and care (ECEC) 

For nursery schools and voluntary / private settings providing funded provision for the final pre-school year (ages three to four), the framework for quality assurance is the same as that for schools (see the subheading ‘Schools’ below).

For other early childhood education and care provision, for example in day nurseries and playgroups, the framework for quality assurance is different. It is based around the registration of providers and inspection against minimum standards.

Under The Children (Northern Ireland) Order 1995, registration aims to:

• protect children
• provide reassurance to persons using independent services who are arranging for their children to be looked after by someone who is not a relation and may be a stranger
• ensure that services meet acceptable standards
• ensure that people wishing to provide services for children do so within an agreed framework.

The 2012 Minimum Standards for Childminding and Day Care for Children under Age 12 (amended October 2018), developed in line with the requirements of the 1995 Order, aim to provide assurance of a consistent level of quality in services, and to ensure a consistent regional approach to registration and inspection. There are 16 minimum standards that registered providers must adhere to, grouped under four headings:

• quality of care (including safeguarding and child protection)
• quality of staffing, management and leadership
• quality of the physical environment
• quality of monitoring and evaluation.

Schools 

In schools, there is a dual system of institutional self-evaluation and external inspection, which aims to promote high standards of education and professional practice. The Inspection and Self-Evaluation Framework (ISEF), effective since January 2017, applies to institutional self-evaluation and external inspection, and data on student performance informs both aspects.

Self-evaluation is positioned as an integral part of school improvement by the Department of Education’s 2009 policy, Every School a Good School – a policy for school improvement. This requires that the resulting actions and targets are captured in a strategic plan for improvement, the School Development Plan (SDP). The process is underpinned by The Education (School Development Plans) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2010 and by guidance from the Department of Education.

External inspection aims to promote the highest possible standards of learning, teaching, training and achievement throughout the education, training and youth sectors.

External school inspection provides an evaluation of the school as an organisation across the broad spectrum of its activities.

The system of external inspection by a dedicated inspectorate is well-established, with an inspectorate first established in 1832. The Department of Education’s powers to inspect schools are set out by Section 102 of The Education and Libraries (Northern Ireland) Order 1986:

‘It shall be the duty of inspectors to promote the highest standards of education and of professional practice among teachers in relevant establishments which provide education by—

(a) monitoring, inspecting and reporting on the standard of education being provided in those establishments and the standards of professional practice among teachers on the staff of such establishments;

(b) advising the Department on any aspect of the curriculum of any of those establishments which the Department may refer to them or on which they think advice is appropriate. ’

The review of teachers’ performance is conducted annually, within the school, as part of the Performance Review and Staff Development Scheme. It is described in the article on ‘Continuing Professional Development’.

Higher education 

The Department for the Economy (DfE) has a statutory duty to make provision for the assessment of the quality of provision that it funds. In relation to higher education, this includes provision in universities, university colleges and in the six further education (FE) colleges. This is set out in Section 102 of The Education and Libraries (Northern Ireland) Order 1986.

The model for quality assessment of higher education is designed to be proportionate, risk-based and grounded in the mission and context of an individual university or college and the composition of its student body. It aims to target regulatory activity on those institutions that represent greater risk to the student interest or to the reputation of the sector. This approach was introduced from 2017/18.

Other arrangements relevant to quality assurance in higher education include:

• the Quality Code for Higher Education (QAA, 2018), which sets out expectations and core practices for UK HE providers
• external examining – external examiners ensure an independent assessment of academic standards at the HE institution making the award
• the publication of information, such as the UK performance indicators published by the Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA)
• external assessment of the quality of research through the Research Excellence Framework for UK HE institutions
• the Teaching Excellence and Student Outcomes Framework (TEF), in which HE providers in Northern Ireland can choose to participate.

Further education and work-based training 

Performance monitoring plays an important role in quality assurance.

The governing bodies of Northern Ireland’s six further education (FE) colleges are accountable to the Minister for the Economy for the college’s performance. In accordance with Section 13 of The Further Education (Northern Ireland) Order 1997:

‘(1) It shall be the duty of the governing body of an institution of further education-

(a) to secure the efficient and effective management of the institution; and

(b) to ensure that the institution provides, or secures the provision of, suitable and efficient further education to students of the institution. ’

A number of measures are in place to monitor the performance of colleges and training providers.

• The Department for the Economy (DfE) issues quarterly health check reports on FE colleges, providing information on their financial, academic and efficiency performance.
• FE colleges are required to submit an annual College Development Plan to the DfE, including information on the number of students, the courses provided and financial reports.
• All FE colleges and training providers must submit annual documentation to the DfE, including a whole-organisation quality improvement (QI) plan, informed by self-evaluation.

As with other phases of education, external inspection of further education and work-based learning is conducted by the Education and Training Inspectorate (ETI), using the Inspection and Self-Evaluation Framework (ISEF).

Article last reviewed April 2021.