Page 12 - ELG1601 Jun Issue 437

Page iv ELquality analysis 2016

publishing official infor- Excellence by association

he UK leads the world in

Tmation, according to a
World Wide Web Foundation
report in 2015. This is certainly Melanie Butler explains how benchmarking international associations to their UK
true of school inspections,
of which the British Council members’ results can help find top-class language centres throughout the world
reports are just one example.
In fact, although most major
student destinations inspect lan- inspected year-round private almost perfect distribution curve allowed to publish their reports, marking of their member schools is lightly less consistent but still
guage teaching centres, only two language school. The mode dropping sharply from five stars though not many do. Currently, is anything to go by, choosing a outperforms the British Council
– the UK and France – make the score for the British Council is to four stars and more gently to Ialc reports are not in the public school inspected by Ialc means average and, indeed, the profile
reports publicly available. one star, with some 30 per cent three stars, two stars and then domain. you are statistically likely to go of most of the major interna-
So how can you judge the scoring one point of strength or one. Not only are the majority of If the British Council bench- to an excellent school. Eaquals tional chains. n
quality of language centres in the below, while the mode score of Ialc’s nearly thirty UK members
rest of the world? One answer both Ialc and Eaquals schools in the top 20 per cent of lan-
is by looking for members of is five stars, which means just guage schools in the UK, but if Distribution of all BC-accredited year-round private language schools
two international language over 50 per cent of their mem- you chose an Ialc school at ran-
centre inspection schemes: the ber schools score eight points of dom you are three times as likely
Independent Association of strength or more on their British to end up at a four- or five-star 100 all 13 Ialc
Language Centres (Ialc), which Council inspections. school than one of average qual- 11 schools withdrawn 12 0 schools withdrawn
inspects study abroad inde- The higher scores of the ity or below. 90
pendent language schools in international associations are Eaquals has a more jagged 11 Eaquals
22 countries, and Eaquals, the not unexpected; they both set profile, with 50 per cent of 80 10 1 school withdrawn
European Association of Qual- out to recruit the best schools, schools at five star but around
ity Language Schools, which and they both choose from cen- 20 per cent at three, the mean 70 9
mainly operates in Europe and tres which have already been average score for UK schools,
inspects language centres of inspected. Of course, it is also and slightly more one-star 60 8
all types, whether involved true that schools can opt for this schools than two-star ones. Number of schools 7
in study abroad or catering to extra inspection, whereas in the This may seem surprising given 50 Number of schools
their local market. Because UK they need to be inspected that more Eaquals members are 6
both these associations run their by a government-approved in chains – Ialc specialises in 40 5
own inspection schemes and accreditation body, not neces- independent schools and bou-
both insist that, where possible, sarily the British Council, if tique groups – but as we have 30 4
members are also inspected by they want to enrol students shown on the previous page, 3
their national scheme, it is pos- from outside the European many chains are not as consist- 20
sible to use the results of their Union. In other words, centres ent as they should be. It would 2
UK schools to benchmark their choose to undergo these addi- seem that Eaquals schools fall 10
members’ performance against tional inspections because they into two distinct clumps: those 1
the British Council. want to be identified as high- that pass, which is still higher 0 0
As you can see from the quality schools. than the British Council aver-
graphs on this page, the profile Although both organisations age, and those that do very well.
of the UK members of both Ialc do well at the top, when it comes If only Eaquals published all
and Eaquals is stronger than that to the distribution of scores Ialc their results, we would know.
of the average British-Council- comes in well ahead, with an Individual Eaquals schools are

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