PAST EVENTS
QUALITY & QUALITY ASSURANCE: BEYOND POLICING TO TOTAL QUALITY MANAGEMENT
1) Preamble
The Global Quality Assurance Association (GQAA) hosted a transformative three-day Quality Assurance Symposium between May 14th to 16th, 2024. This event brought together prominent individuals from various higher education institutions (HEIs) across Africa, aiming to delve into the broader picture of quality assurance (QA) and its multifaceted benefits beyond mere compliance and policing. The symposium provided a comprehensive understanding of quality assurance practices and their significant impact on institutional excellence through the lens of total quality management (TQM) and the designing of appropriate QA tools.
It should be noted that in each of the GQAA’s engagements 2 trophies (one for a male and another one for a female delegate) are always given out to 2 people as decided by the other delegates. For this event, it was Dr Cynthia Bannerman from the Accra College of Medicine & Dr Moshood Babatunde Lawal from University of Nigeria.
THE INDIA INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE
HARMONY IN INNOVATION: NAVIGATING THE GLOBAL BUSINESS LANDSCAPES THROUGH EMERGING TECHNOLOGIES & DYNAMIC MANAGEMENT STRATEGIES
Done and dusted!!! The Dr D. Y. Pital B-School international conference was well.organized. Thank you Dean Prof Atul Kumar, PhD, Aditya Dey and Akshaya Kolhe for the opportunity and wonderful handling of the keynote speakers and delegates. This was an excellent opportunity to learn and share. Even the time differences between Ghana and India could not prevent us from building bridges and work together. Just like our name suggests (GLOBAL QUALITY ASSURANCE ASSOCIATION), we can and want to work with many across the globe at institutional/organizational/industry, national, regional, continental and global levels.
I shared on building the quality culture, adoption, adaptation and agility to remain afloat in businesses, ethical issues, interpersonal relationships, focus on common goals and achievements, lifelong learning and hard work among other things.
I learnt a lot from other keynote speakers like Dr Mohamed Masry who made me get a deeper understanding of how Climate change really impact negatively on businesses. His real life examples included its impact on agriculture productivity and destruction of infrastructure like the transport system, power, etc during climate change induced disasters like floods.
THE SOKOINE UNIVERSITY OF AGRICULTURE WORKSHOP 18th – 22nd MARCH 2024 CATE HOTEL, MOROGORO, TANZANIA
A hearty congratulations and thank you Sokoine University of Agriculture (SUA) Morogoro, Tanzania for affording Dr Violet Makuku the opportunity to work with you at institutional level. This comes after the 2022, Moshi, Mt Kilimanjaro, Tanzania encounter with the SUA gentlemen (Dr Anthony Zozimus Sangeda & Dr Alcardo Alex) who were involved in the Enhancing Entrepreneurship, Innovation and Sustainability in Higher Education in Africa (EEISHEA) project that was funded by the European Union’s Erasmus+. Sokoine University of Agriculture is one of those institutions which continues to tap into and benefit from the main objectives of the EEISHEA Project despite the fact that the project is no longer running. They are giving an excellent example of sustainability long after the project funded timeline ended. The institution aims to re-design 100 programmes with the intention to apply student-centred learning approaches, which include but are not limited to active student participation, problem-based, challenge driven and team-based learning, among others.
There is overwhelming evidence that there are misconceptions and misunderstandings of quality, quality assurance and a lot of aspects associated with them within some Higher Education (HE) academic institutions in Africa. Overall, this results in a lack of clearly defined goals and so in the end the achievement of certain goals is compromised to a greater extent and/or is never realized. Part of the evidence has been noted during institutional assessments and evaluations for self-improvement, during the Global Quality Assurance Association (GQAA) workshops and events, during programme reviews and site visits for programme accreditation, as well as what prevails within some HE academic institutions.
Congratulations to the GLOBAL QUALITY ASSURANCE ASSOCIATION (GQAA) for its very first event which was well attended by people from across the globe. The countries represented included, but were not limited to Australia, USA, Botswana, Cameroon, Egypt, Eswatini, Gambia, Ghana, India, Kenya, Lesotho, Malawi, Namibia, Nigeria, South Africa, Uganda, Tanzania, Zambia, Zimbabwe.
When it is highly relevant, useful and exciting, it attracts a lot of participants, and no one wants to leave even after the allocated time for the event has lapsed. This was exactly what it turned out be for the event which was announced just 2 days ago. For old Drs and Profs, it was a time for retooling and for early career academics, it was a time to add more knowledge and refine academic writing skills.
As the Director of the GLOBAL QUALITY ASSURANCE ASSOCIATION, I, DR VIOLET MAKUKU, would like to sincerely thank our partner Harare Institute of Technology, the GQAA volunteers and all who managed to attend because it takes 2 to TANGO. It cannot be an event without an audience. You are all highly valued. Watch the space as we continue to roll out more events and activities related to quality and quality assurance matters in all sectors (manufacturing, service provision and extraction companies/organizations/institutions/public sector, etc).
Institutional workshops on Quality Assurance, Research Methods, Completing the Research Process, Learner-Centred Approaches, Curriculum Issues (Including Programme design & Programme Review), Employability & Entrepreneurship, Accreditation Process (including Self assessments and reports).
