In the context of your teaching institution, discuss the quality assurance processes and describe the roles of external bodies and stakeholders and how your organisation is accountable to them.

The institution that I am currently placed with is Bird College of Dance, Music and Theatre Performance, founded in 1946 by a woman named Doreen Bird, where it was founded as the Doreen Bird College of Performing Arts. As an independent college Bird have slightly different roles and responsibilities than say a normal state college. However, they do still have very clear Quality Assurance processes.

Bird College have a quality assurance cycle that assures that they are measuring their success in all the key areas that they operate. The areas are as follows; teaching observations, meetings, assessment moderation, self-assessment report (SAR), PMR, AIR, group tutorials, learner voice, pastoral care, application/audition data, enrolment data, retention data, success data, target setting, progression and classifications, attendance, handbooks and MIS. So as you can tell there is a lot that goes into the quality assurance process at Bird College.

If I was to go into all of the above in detail then we would be here all day, so I shall take two of the above key areas and describe the process in more detail. Firstly, I will discuss the teaching observations and there are three main events within this process. The first event is in September with the inclusion of results into the SAR, this is then followed in November/December by the creation of the OTL cycle; observations will then take place over the coming months. Then finally in July there is the moderation of OTL grades, collation of OTL forms and analysis of department OTL results.

The second key area I will discuss is the meetings within the college. Meetings are happening all the time within the college in terms of departmental meetings as well as meeting with the board of directors. In September, October, November, January, February, April and May there are Heads of Department meetings, then the Leadership Group meets every month of the year. Other meetings include the HE & FE Board, Academic Board and Board of Directors which occur in November, February and June. So a lot of important meetings are put into place in order to keep the college in order.

The college also submits an annual Self-assessment report to the EFA and a Programme Monitoring report to the University of Greenwich, who it is partnered with. The college also consult and work with student reps on some of the key quality assurance areas that affect the learner journey.

Now I will discuss the roles of external bodies and stakeholders within the college. The first external body is the EFA, as mentioned above, the EFA is responsible for funding the Diploma Qualification. Bird College submits an annual self-assessment report to the EFA and are subject to Ofsted inspections. Another external body is the University of Greenwich who the college submits an annual Programme Monitoring Report, have an external examiner and work with the colleges link tutor to ensure compliance with the Quality Assurance practices of the university.

Bird College are validated by Trinity College London and are subject to inspections every five years. They also have assessment moderators see a range of assessments on the Diploma programme. Accreditation comes from the Council for Dance Education, this is similar to Trinity College in the fact that Bird are subject to re-accreditation every five years and are involved in a very extensive inspection.

Last but by no means least, Bird Colleges Board of Directors oversees all of the quality assurance, external bodies and stakeholders and ultimately Bird College are accountable to the Board of Directors.