Quality assurance process lessons learnt
col. Petko Petkov
Riga, 23 MAY 2016
BILC conference
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Continual improvement and alignment to
strict academic standards
Provide the academic needs of NATO, partner
country, and non-member countries by
ensuring adherence to NATO standards and
processes
Funding
NATO APPROVED
Meets a NATO E&IT requirement,
Institution accredited by HQ SACT/JFT
NATO SELECTED
Meets NATO E&IT requirement,
Institution not accredited by HQ SACT/JFT
NATO LISTED
not necessarily align with a NATO E&IT
requirement
NATO UNCLASSIFIED/ from LTC, M. Umut CAKIR, (TUR, A)
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Request for QA - 2014
On site visit by QA team SEP-2015
Preliminary report – NOV-2015
Report/ improvement – MAY -2016
Final decision -???
Not more than 6 institutions yearly 
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Designate a team of knowledgeable persons
responsible for working this process. This
team will collaborate to:
◦ Correspond with ACT;
◦ Identify possible weak areas;
◦ Remediate those identified weaknesses;
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Prepare for team visit
Host team
Follow up as necessary
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Carefully read questionnaire and be prepared to show
documentation for compliance in each topical area.
Have established processes, policies and
requirements in place and well documented,
especially those pertaining to:
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Curriculum development and course documentation
Quality assurance
Faculty and professional development
Student registration, acceptance and attendance
Organization and communication within institution – RACI
matrix
In ENGLISH please… Follow 75-7 recommendations
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Carefully select the date for the team visit –
coordinated with QA team.
Ensure availability of all key personnel, to
include:
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Senior Leaders
Functional area representatives
Curriculum
Quality Assurance
Faculty Development
Admissions
Selected Faculty members
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Prepare for the team visit and facilitate their
review, by
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Organizing all documentation
Dedicating a workspace for the visiting team
Providing technology (AV, computers, etc.)
Scheduling requested interviews
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Communicate with accreditation team!
◦ Read all correspondence
◦ Ask questions when unsure
◦ Provide timely response to all correspondence or
inquiries
◦ Agree in advance on documents format (.pdf is one
good option)
◦ One PoC for QA process? Have second in charge?
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PTEC Involvement in Quality Assurance (QA) process:
SWEDINT –2013-unconditional
Turkish PfPTC –2014-unconditional
FINCENT –2015-unconditional
DRESMARA –2015-unconditional
FLD (Bulgaria) –2015-conditional
JSOU (USA) –2016-unconditional
Two PTECs applied for QA accreditation in 2016
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PSOTC –Bosnia and Herzegovina –in process (February)
The Slovak Armed Forces Academy –in process (November)
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Key E&T staff need to take courses at NATO School in
Oberammergau:
◦ M7-136 NATO Analysis, Design, and Evaluation Course,
◦ M7-135 NATO Global Programming Analysis Course,
◦ M7-137 NATO Quality Assurance Course.
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Follow the recommendations of QA team, of course in the
framework of specific environment…