Community learning and development is learning and social development work with individuals and groups in their communities using a range of formal and informal methods. A common defining feature is that programmes and activities are developed in dialogue with communities and participants.
Working and Learning Together: to build stronger communities (WALT), Scottish Executive, 2004.
This document is designed to support evaluation of the quality of services delivering community learning and development (CLD), including adult literacy and numeracy (ALN), in Scotland.
It outlines an approach to self-evaluation which senior managers, local managers or practitioners working directly with young people, adults and community groups can use. It builds on ongoing work across all sectors on evaluating services and planning for improvement. At the heart of the document is a set of quality indicators and performance measures which will help practitioners identify the strengths in their practice and where further development is required. HM Inspectors will use the same set of quality indicators and performance measures in external evaluation of services thus developing a partnership approach to internal and external evaluation of services.
The structures, systems and local priorities of CLD providers across Scotland vary and are likely to change and evolve over time. These materials can be used flexibly in the context of local situations in a way that ensures that key issues will be addressed. The approach to self-evaluation is generic enough for use in CLD, or can be customised to different situations and across agencies, including voluntary and community organisations.
The quality and performance indicators for CLD have been developed within an overall structure for quality assurance. This overall structure provides coherence to the range of quality models used by different public services in any sector. The structure encourages those providing CLD services to consider the quality of their work in relation to six high-level questions:
1. What key outcomes have we achieved?
2. What impact have we had in meeting the needs of our stakeholders?
3. How good is our delivery of key processes?
4. How good is our operational management?
5. How good is our strategic leadership?
6. What is our capacity for improvement?
Using a common set of quality indicators for self-evaluation and inspection helps to provide a common language and agenda for all involved in the evaluation process and makes the inspection process more transparent. It facilitates an open dialogue about evaluations and promotes consistency across different areas and different evaluators.
I would like to acknowledge the invaluable contributions of a wide range of individuals and agencies to the development of this framework. It is important that the framework is owned by those who seek to use it for self-evaluation leading to quality improvement.
Graham Donaldson
Her Majesty’s Senior Chief Inspector