Beauty from the East: Reflections on the ETF Quality Assurance Forum in VET, Amman Meeting

Post added by Dalia Taha

During the last week of past February, I was attending the annual meeting of Qualifications Platform Representatives in ETF premises in Turin. At that time, Europe was battered by icy, frigid weather nicknamed "Beast from the East" due to be swept in from over Russia- in the East, and where an extraordinarily cold weather event which was unprecedented to me in Turin.

Few days later, I was participating in the ETF Forum for Quality Assurance in VET in Amman, Jordan, where a totally different mild spring weather sunny and warm most of the day hours and which you can easily nickname it "Beauty from the East!"

The meeting of ETF Forum for Quality Assurance in VET had various objectives, including: follow up and review progress since the launch event¹ (which took place in November 2017), agree on the 2018 work plan, and to deepen knowledge on accreditation and quality assurance of VET in Jordan.

A comprehensive presentation about quality assurance and accreditation of VET in Jordan has been prepared by the Center of Accreditation and Quality Assurance (CAQA) and presented by Eng. Muhammad Khair Irshaid, (Director of CAQA) to introduce the different phases of quality assurance and accreditation to the participants, including: 1) preparation and development of standards; 2) licensing and accreditation process; and 3) preparing and developing the occupational exams.

If I give some reflections and observations about the Jordanian experience on quality assurance and accreditation of VET qualifications, I would say: 1) It is a well established system in terms of VET; 2) CAQA prepared many guiding book for each step in the process of quality assurance and accreditation; and 3) One of the important observations when we visited an accredited academy is that there is nothing special for quality assurance as it is already part of their everyday job.

This meeting in Amman as a part of ETF Forum for Quality Assurance in VET activities was a successful meeting, which really provided the context and means of peer-learning and helped to identify and share quality assurance expertise, methods, and instruments of VET with other countries.

¹ https://www.etf.europa.eu/en/news-and-events/events/etf-forum-quality-assurance-vocational-education-and-training-launch-event