SQA Orientation and training in Malaysia

The Scottish Qualifications Authority conducted a special orientation and training for SQA partners on the 19th and 20th of February, 2013. This event was attended by the Head of Department of Examinations, Mr. Asela Cooray and Mr. Mevan Wickramasinghe, Manager Education programmes.

The purpose of this programme was to welcome centre partners to the Scottish Qualifications Authority and to provide guidance and training on SQA policies and Academic Practices.

The even was held in Kuala Lumpur Malaysia and was attended by over 10 international SQA centers from the region. The first day of event was an introduction to support practitioners with the delivery and assessment of HN Frameworks by providing information, facilitating network discussion sessions and encouraging networking between centre partners. This was then followed by an update by the senior External Verifier for the SQA on changes to centre verification policies from the 2010 to the 2013/2014 framework and provided a comprehensive training in areas such as Internal assessment reporting, Unit specifications, instruments of assessment and exemplification models, centre evidence requirements, administration of assessments and areas of good practice.

The next stage of the event was a practical demonstration and workshop on assessment delivery where the points discussed were covered through a practical scenario. Then the discussion progressed to good practices to be followed, drawing from experiences from other centres. Some key areas of discussion included recording reasons for decisions where candidate evidence is on the cusp, recording problems and discussion in IV records, electronic submission and plagiarism checks and detailed feedback and guidance. This concluded the first day of the workshop.

The second day of the workshop was focused on course content development and the importance of creating assessments that are designed with a contextual approach and which suit the candidates needs and also emphasized the need for constant feedback between assessors and module leads to ensure that assessments are always fit for purpose.

The next stage was a detailed overview of the 2013/2014 framework that was delivered with the intent of updating the knowledge of key centre personnel to effectively comply with these quality assurance requirements.

The event was an extreme success and at the conclusion of the training programme, the training certifications were handed out to the attendees by the Chief Executive of SQA Dr. Janet Brown. The award for the Java Institute for Advanced Technology was accepted on behalf the institute by Mr. Mevan Wickramasinghe.