The Botswana Qualifications Authority(BQA) held a TVET providers workshop stressing the importance of continuous engagement and discussion on the registration and accreditation of Education Training Provider’s(ETP) on the National Credit and Qualifications Framework, a new feature of the education and training system before the stipulated deadline on the 2nd December 2018.
It also introduced the concept of recognizing prior learning policy intimating that further consultations will be done in an effort to review existing tools and instruments for a concept in its embryonic stages.
“Change is not easy and there is a need to update each other on achievements and challenges and collectively come up with mitigating strategies,” said Selebo Auma Jobe, Acting Chief Executive Officer(CEO) of the Botswana Qualifications Authority(BQA).
She said, “The process of evaluation of qualifications is ongoing amidst the challenges due to an unanticipated high number of applications. BQA doing its best and thank providers and employers for their understanding.”
Selebo stressed the importance of ETPs whose accreditation expires in December 2018 and who have not yet submitted applications for renewal to do so immediately.
The BQA regulations instruct ETP’s to apply at least 6 months prior to expiry with those valid beyond December 2018 expected to submit variances to trigger audits, to ensure continued compliance.
Stakeholders have welcomed the ETP consultations but expressed misgiving about workload created during the exercise given limited human resource cohort available to the BQA.
“Our view is that the move to regulate service providers is welcome. Consumers will be assured of quality value for money and service providers will enjoy the appropriate recognition,” said Golekanye Setume, Business Botswana Education sector Chairperson.
He said, “It is a new system and it has some teething problems. The chief one being that BQA needs to better capacitate itself to deliver and ETP’s need assistance top meet compliance requirements.”
Setume revealed that everybody is on a learning curve and both parties should therefore avoid hardline positions to enable tangible progress. There was a need to make the relationship more accessible.
“It is however a little disconcerting that the registration of qualification needed external experts,” said Setume.
According to BQA officials following the introduction of the registration exercise, some ETP’s are now submitting qualifications for registration on the NCQF with the first group of experts trained on the qualifications validation panel already completed.
More capacity building by international experts is anticipated to cater for the different sub-fields of learning to ensure international competitiveness, relevance of qualifications and portability of these awards. The system literally looks at education from the cradle to the grave.
There was however a feeling by some service providers that it was not useful to discuss issues relating to the requirements on prior learning because the regulating authority was not sufficiently well prepared.
“BQA presented about recognition of prior learning but could not explain issues related to them clearly. They said some of their policies are not ready even though it was one of their presentation,” said Steve Nhamo, Managing Director of Pritaste.
There were also complaints raised on the adverse impact of delays on the registration and accreditation of courses due to poor turnaround times by the regulating authority.
“Customer service is lacking at BQA. They do not give us feedback and do not always stick to their given timeframes. This relationship should be a two way street,” said Irene Motsomi, Managing Director of Pimotse Training Consultants.
She said, “We are business people and we help Government create employment. We employ young people and should not be made to suffer because of BQA’s capacity constraints. The registration and accreditation of courses is a nightmare with BQA. I for example tried to register a course last year in November 2017 and I still have not received a response. My business is therefore suffering.”
There was also a feeling that the registration and accreditation of courses should be made more flexible for short courses. Courses running for a few days should not have to go through the same rigorous examination like those involving diplomas and degrees covering a much longer period.
“1 week courses do not need high expenses and thorough examination. The price of courses is prohibitive. If I want to run a 3 day workshop Government will want me to be registered,” said Joseph Willie, Managing Director of Joina Consultants.
He said, “We want to be able to make an application and get an answer in 1 month.”
