In July 21st ─ 23rd 2021, the International Institute for Capacity Building in Africa (IICBA) conducted a webinar in Uganda to train Quality Assurance (QA) committees from three selected teacher-training institutions (Arua PTC, Kibuli PTC and NTC Mubende). The aim of the training was to strengthen quality assurance in teacher education. The webinar provided opportunities for teacher educators to reflect on internal quality assurance procedures and mechanisms in their institutions and  domesticate the generic toolkit (QA framework; QA guidelines, monitoring & evaluation framework and self-diagnostic tools).

This training was designed in response to the findings of a situation analysis of eight teacher-training institutions in Uganda conducted in 2018, which found that quality assurance in teacher education was a challenge. As a result, UNESCO/IICBA developed a generic Quality Assurance Toolkit in collaboration with the Teacher Education Training and Development department (TETD), Makerere University's Department of Science, Technical and Vocational Education (DSTVE), the Directorate of Education Standards (DES), Uganda National Council for Science and Technology (UNCST) and the Directorate of Education Standards (DES). This was followed by a technical workshop on strengthening quality assurance programs in selected teacher education institutions that was held in Hotel Africana in December 2020. This workshop was attended by teacher educators, ministry of education personnel, and other stakeholders. During the same technical workshop, a road map for piloting the generic QA toolkit was discussed. Also, establishment and building of capacity of QA committees who would steer QA activities in teacher training institutions emerged as one of the priorities.

Based on the  quality assurance limitations highlighted by the situation analysis of 2018, Arua PTC, Kibuli PTC, and NTC Mubende, were chosen as trial sites for QA. As one of the activities of piloting QA, a webinar of July 21st ─ 23rd 2021 was organized to build the capacity of these three institutions to pilot quality assurance and strengthen the culture of internal QA.

During the webinar, participants reviewed QA procedures and mechanisms in their respective colleges, customized generic guidelines, monitoring and evaluation and  self diagnostic tools to local college contexts. Participants also discussed modalities for implementation of institutional QA in the context of college closure. One of the key issues that emerged was that although each institution has a QA mechanism, none of the institutions had a QA unit. As a way forward, it was agreed that each college completes the tasks below:

1. Concludes on the composition membership of  the QA committee.
2. Completes drafting roles and responsibilities of the QA committee
3. Completes customizing the guidelines and self-diagnostic tools.
4. Create a QA unit in your institution.

Since there were take home tasks, it was agreed that one day a webinar will be organized as a follow up of the take home tasks.

Participants of the webinar included principals and deputy, registrars, Directors of Studies (DOS) tutors, principal tutors, senior tutors and lecturers.

Picture 1: Participants during webinar

The webinar will be followed by support supervision/monitoring and documenting lessons learnt to support rolling of internal QA to other teacher training institutions in Uganda.