Vision and mission

QIA's vision is for a learning and skills sector known for:

• the excellence of its achievements and the public value it creates
• its ability to meet the changing needs of individuals, society and the economy
• its inventiveness, capacity to innovate and ability to find creative responses to new challenges

QIA will be a critical friend to the sector, challenging sector organisations and those engaged in learning, teaching and training to achieve their potential. We will be:

• respected for the quality of our expertise
• appreciated for the insight we offer
• valued for the contribution we make

We will be an honest broker, creating programmes to help accelerate improvement and connecting organisations with those programmes through delivery partners.

We will work with government to ensure policies are informed by the knowledge and experience of the learning and skills sector and help organisations implement new policy initiatives.

Our role is to support, lead and challenge the sector in quality improvement.

We will identify the most effective ways of supporting individuals and organisations in their pursuit of excellence and we will work to stimulate and support a culture of continuous self-improvement.

We will champion the public value of the sector for individuals, society and the economy. We will spearhead thinking on improvement and its measurement, and lead collaboration between sector agencies on all improvement matters.

We will listen and learn and draw lessons from research and best practices from other sectors and countries. We will evaluate what we commission to ensure that we are funding the best possible improvement services.

We will be a critical friend to the sector and an honest broker in leading improvement strategy. We will question how and why things are done and we will be prepared to challenge the sector to find new ways of improving quality.

Our approach tells you how we see our role. The corporate plan outlines our strategy.

QIA believes there is a lot to celebrate about our sector but much more to do in the drive for excellence.

The successes of the past few years have been in the context of planning, funding and inspection arrangements. These have been effective in reducing poor practice and raising standards but do not, themselves bring about excellence.

For the sector to achieve really high quality, teachers, trainers, tutors & support staff, managers and leaders have to learn from what they do and act to make improvements themselves. External forces can set standards and help root out underperformance, but real achievements must come from within.

This means:

• adopting excellence as a goal rather than compliance – something the outstanding organisations in the sector do already
• encouraging people to be open to learning so that their own quest for improvement is at the heart of the way they work
• seeing self-assessment as fundamental to identifying professional development and quality improvement needs

Building on what is already outstanding is a primary driver for QIA. Much of what we need to know about achieving excellence is to be found in the sector from the people working in it. QIA's role is to add value to the sector by supporting self-improvement – through effective transfer of knowledge and by supporting effective talent management.