Defining Quality of Lifelong Non-formal Education and Training
By Dr. Fuad Sultanov, EPIC College of Technology, ASQ Quality Quotes, Vol. 36, No 17, Dec 2011
(re-printed with permission of the American Society for Quality, Toronto Section)

Concepts of Quality Assurance evolved in the mid twentieth century in the manufacturing sector with transformation of craft-production into mass-production and have been rapidly spreading to non-industry related areas such as banking, insurance, software development, transportation, etc. One of the areas, where the systematic approach to quality was not clearly defined until now is the non-formal education and training of adult learners.

In comparison with academic education, where the curriculum is concerned with fundamental disciplines and does not require frequent changes, the professional development and training of adult learners has to be more dynamic and responsive to evolution of technology and resulting needs in new professional competences.

In need of consideration as well, the unprecedented scale and pace of advancements in science and technology have created extraordinary constraints in terms of justifiable resources, time and efforts that can be invested into the development of training programs that are subject to frequent changes or risk of quickly becoming obsolete. As a result of these constraints the average quality of the non-formal education and training programs has a tendency to decline in many industry and non-industry sectors.

Another source of quality concerns in non-formal education and training is the lack of involvement of professional educators in the development stages as the currently offered programs are mostly driven by technology developers rather than educators.

The quality dilemma of the increasing number of training programs with a short life-span resembles early problems of mass-production in the manufacturing industry. The need for a faster turn-around in development of training programs at a reduced cost and increased efficiency of educational outcomes has been in need of a solution to the quality problems for a long time.

In September 2010, in recognition of the increasing need for higher quality non-formal education and training, the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) has released the first of its kind standard that outlines best practices for the provision of vocational and lifelong learning programs.

The standard is referred to ISO 29990:2010 “Learning services for non-formal education and training. Basic requirements for service providers”. It builds on the quality concepts defined in the highly popular ISO 9000 series of quality assurance standards. The new standard employs the same proven principles of quality assurance while including additional requirements that specifically focus on the essentials of design, delivery, evaluation and improvement of vocational and lifelong training programs.

The ISO 29990:2010 standard sets clear and measurable criteria allowing training service providers to ensure the quality of their programs. The new standard is endorsed by the Canadian Standards Association along with the national standardization organizations of 20 other countries. Organizations or departments within organizations involved in development and delivery of non-formal education and training programs may acquire the new certification from a number of ISO registrars.

Dr. Fuad Sultanov is the Principal of Epic College and has a Ph. D. in Civil Engineering. He is a former Quality Assurance Manager and ISO Lead Auditor for North American and European Organizations.