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Directorate of National Qualification Authority

INTRODUCTION

The promulgation of the Namibia Qualifications Authority, Act of 1996 let to the establishment of a statutory body – the Namibia Qualifications Authority (NQA) The objects of the NQA are embedded in the aforesaid Act, and these are:

to set-up and administer a national qualifications framework;
to be a forum for matters pertaining to qualifications;
to set the occupational standards for any occupation, job, post, or position in any career structure;
to set the curriculum standards required for achieving the occupational standards for a given occupation, job, post, or position in a career structure;
to promote the development of, and to analyse, bench marks of acceptable performance norms for any occupation, job, post, or position;
to accredit persons, institutions and organisations providing education and courses of instruction or training of meeting certain requirements as set out in section 13;
to evaluate and recognise competencies learnt outside formal education;
to establish facilities for the collection and dissemination of information in connection with matters pertaining to qualifications;
to inquire into whether any particular qualification meets the national standards;
to advise any person, body, institution, organisation or interest group on matters pertaining to qualifications and national standards for qualifications.

The Namibia Qualifications Authority strives achieve a (NQF) which allows Namibians to develop to their fullest potential without artificial barriers and validly, reliably, fairly and equitably recognizes recognizing their learning achievements and competencies, no matter how, where or when such learning achievements and competencies were attained. The NQA is committed to the promotion of quality education and training in Namibia through the development and maintenance of a comprehensive and flexible National Qualifications Framework. The realization of the NQA mandate is done through:

Administration of the NQA
Setting of standards for qualifications
Accreditation, Audit and Assessment
Evaluation of Qualifications

MAIN ACTIVITIES AND ACHIEVEMENTS

1.The Third Council of the Namibia Qualifications Authority

The NQA Act stipulates that its activities be governed by a representative Council consisting of 36 members drawn from a wide array of sectors. During the year under review Hon. Nangolo Mbumba appointed the Third Council of the NQA. The NQA Council is responsible for advising the Minister of Education at his request or proactively on all matters that pertain to qualifications by:

Assuming responsibility for quality assurance for Education and Training in Namibia
Monitoring and evaluating compliance with policy goals
Reflecting on the state of education and training in Namibia
Ensuring that the NQA operates in the interest of all Namibian with interests in education and training viz. learners, training providers, professional bodies, lobby groups, employers, organised labour and the government. On their behalf the council sets objectives each year and monitor performance against such objectives.

Among the activities carried out by the council during the year under review are the approvals of the Policy establishing the NQF, the Accreditation standards and the NQA logo, which are pending gazetting prior to launching. It is gratifying to note a heightening awareness of the importance of the NQF and the role the NQA plays in quality assuring all Namibian Qualifications.

Work progress

Also significant progress has been made through the NQF registration of the Namibia Senior Secondary Certificate. (NSSC). Agreement has been reached between the NQA and the NTA regarding possible overlapping of functions in the mandate of the soon to be enacted NTA. A Memorandum of Understanding between the bodies has been signed whichunderstanding in essence rationalises the activities of the two entities without diluting their respective functions.

In an effort to finalise the development of the revised National Qualifications Framework (NQF), a consultative workshop on the characteristics of the Masters of Business Administration was organized and was attended by national and regional experts from Tanzania and South Africa .

Negotiations with the National Council for Higher Education (NCHE) were initiated in order to harmonize all education and training endeavours. The NQA had the opportunity to benchmark itself with similar agencies abroad whilst participating in amongst others:

development of the Southern African Development Community Qualifications Frame Work SADCQF
The Fifth International Congress in Higher Education organised by the Cuban government under the theme: Universalization of the University.
South –South Dialogue group under the aegis of UNESCO on the Assessment and Recognition of informal and non-formal learning
UNESCO Panel of Experts on Quality Assuring Cross border delivery of qualifications.

The NQA Council also approved the Human Resources Structure and Grading for remuneration purposes.

Staff Appointments3.:

During the year Council resolved to appoint additional staff members. Subsequently, six (6) Accreditation and Standards Setting officers were appointed. In house training was provided by Cue-F Consulting. The section also introduced the new Accreditation policy to providers through training workshops held in April and June. The purpose of the training was to introduce the new policy to the providers and assist them in completing applications for accreditation. By December 2005, the section had received about 35 applications for accreditation and a desk evaluation was completed for most of them. The section also conducted several verification visits in conjunction with City and Guilds ( South Africa ) for local providers.

4.Setting of Standards for Qualifications

The NQA provided technical support to the following organisations in the development of standards:

Nampower
Namibia Tourism Board
Institute of Bankers
Namfisa

Namwater
Namibia Training Authority
Finance Sector
Namibia Aviation Training Academy

Teacher Education Standards

During 2005 the scoping study towards the developments of standards for the teaching profession in Namibia was completed. The outcome of the study outlines recommendations for a framework towards the development of the professional standards for teachers. A matrix outlining the key priority areas has been developed from the scoping study and these will be used for the second phase which starts in February 2006. The second phase second phase under the consultancy of a South African Company will thus focus on the following key priority areas:

The development of Professional Standards and a Qualifications Framework for teacher qualifications;
Alignment of pre-service education programs with the professional standards
Establishment of the Professional Learning Framework for teachers (in-service education) based on professional standards.

In addition, the NQA started with the development of a Recognition of Prior Learning (RPL) Policy during the year under review. The RPL involves the use of credible and practical processes to identify and verify what someone knows, understands and can do. This learning is then formally recognised in a tangible form, regardless of when, where or how the learning took place thus paving the way for life long leaning. After the completion of the internal consultation process, the policy will be distributed to all stakeholders

6.Evaluation of Qualifications

The formal adoption of the NQF means that all qualifications in Namibia will be developed within the context of and expressed in terms of the NQF. The current policy on the evaluation of qualifications does not comply with the philosophy of the NQF therefore a new Policy and Procedures on the Evaluation of Qualifications were developed. In the new Policy on the Evaluation of Qualifications, the Namibia Qualifications Authority evaluates qualifications submitted by individuals to confirm their legality, validity and credibility and to express each qualification in terms of the nomenclature and structural features of the NQF. This will assist with the recognition of qualifications by other bodies for the purpose of academic and/or professional placement of the qualification holder.

The holder of the qualification seeks a formal expression of the comparative relationship of their qualification with qualifications able to be registered on the National Qualifications Framework. Evaluation Criteria are applied to determine each comparative relationship. This distinction between qualification registration and qualification evaluation is illustrated in Figure 1 in terms of the relationships between the qualifications databases held by the Namibia Qualifications Authority.

The NQA Council provisionally approved the new policy and procedures on the

Evaluation of qualifications. With the advent of the new policy, the NQA expects to be in better positioned to deal with qualifications of which the evaluation outcomes have led to extreme dissatisfaction. The Section completed the evaluation of 3 365 applications for the evaluation of qualifications in 2005. The number of enquiries responded to was double the number of evaluations completed.

CHALLENGES

1. Although being an integral part of the Education and Training Sector Improvement Programme (ETSIP), the cross-sectoral nature of the NQA mandate has resulted in our activities to be included as a unique and separate programme only in the second phase of ETSIP. 2. The NQA by virtue of its legislative framework is a statutory body with a clearly pronounced brief. Contrary to these legal requirements, the NQA still operates on two foundations. Some colleagues in the NQA are appointed by Council whilst some remain public servants. This situation leads to different staffing and conditions of service.3. Compliance with the legislative requirements is further hampered by the financial arrangements for funds appropriated by parliament which are transferred to the NQA at the end of the financial year only.

4. Building local capacity and expertise in quality assurance remains an enormous challenge and the NQA has embarked on a campaign to train at least one hundred Namibians in Assessment during 2006.5. The NQA is the custodian of thousands of records that contain data on learner’s records. The implementation of our Information, Communication Technology strategy albeit costly, will improve efficiency and reduce the burden of limited office space.

6. .

7. Across the Southern African region the proliferation of national entities that are all charged with quality assurance, assessment, accreditation and qualifications has let to uncertainties regarding the reach of their roles and functions. Although Namibia is no exception the uniqueness of our situation is that mutually beneficial co-existence has been consolidated through formal cooperation agreements. The Namibia Training Authority, the National Council for Higher Education and the NQA entered formal agreements and clarified our roles within the sector.

CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS

2005 has been yet another busy and eventful year. Building on and continuing with a myriad of activities that relate to quality assurance in education and training. The NQA therefore undertook further steps in finalising and implementing the quality assurance regime. Critical challenges remain in securing and retaining high-level specialist personnel and securing the level of financial resources that are congruent with the effective undertaking of the NQA mandate. However, we remain relentless in our quest for quality qualifications.