Qualifications and Quality Assurance (Education and Training) (Amendment) Bill 2018
Public bill · Government · Presented
It would update Ireland’s qualifications system so more awards can be officially placed in the National Framework of Qualifications, including awards from a new category called listed awarding bodies. It would also let the quality agency check whether education providers are fit and financially able, share information with other State bodies, charge fees for some services, and tackle essay mills and other academic cheating. It would strengthen protections for students by creating a learner protection fund for course failures, tighten rules for the International Education Mark, and give Institutes of Technology broader award-making powers, bringing them closer to universities in status.
Formal long title
Bill entitled an Act to amend and extend the Qualifications and Quality Assurance (Education and Training) Act 2012; for that purpose to make fresh provision concerning the means by which an award’s status, with reference to the National Framework of Qualifications, may be established and, to that end, to provide for the establishment of a category of awarding bodies, exclusive of the Qualifications and Quality Assurance Authority of Ireland or certain other persons, which shall be known as “listed awarding bodies”; to provide, as a condition precedent for provisions of that Act to be invoked by providers falling within a certain category (or intending such providers), for a requirement that criteria specified in regulations, to be made by the Minister for Education and Skills, must be met, including criteria for the purpose of affording a reasonable assurance to the foregoing Authority that a foregoing provider has the capacity and capability to provide programmes of education and training consistent with the requirements of that Act; to provide for the establishment of a fund which shall be known as “Protection of Enrolled Learners Fund”, into which an annual charge by certain providers must be paid and from which moneys may, in cases of default in delivery of certain programmes, be paid so to enable enrolled learners complete the programme concerned or so as to be used for certain other purposes; to make further provision regarding authorisation to use the international education mark; to add to the cases in which a provider may be authorised to describe itself as a “university” and, for that purpose, to amend the Universities Act 1997; and to provide for related matters.
Last updated 31 July 2019
- Minister for Education and Skills Primary
- First StageSeanad
- Second StageSeanad
- Committee StageSeanad
- Report StageSeanad
- Fifth StageSeanad
- Second StageDáil
- Committee StageDáil
- Report StageDáil
- Fifth StageDáil Enacted
- EnactedEnacted
- Qualifications and Quality Assurance (Education and Training) (Amendment) Bill 2018: [Seanad Bill amended by the Dáil] Report and Final Stages Seanad
- Qualifications and Quality Assurance (Education and Training) (Amendment) Bill 2018 [Seanad]: Committee and Remaining Stages Dáil
- Qualifications and Quality Assurance (Education and Training) (Amendment) Bill 2018 [Seanad]: Second Stage (Resumed) Dáil
- Qualifications and Quality Assurance (Education and Training) (Amendment) Bill 2018 [Seanad]: Referral to Select Committee Dáil
- Qualifications and Quality Assurance (Education and Training) Amendment Bill 2018 [Seanad]: Second Stage (Resumed) Dáil
- Qualifications and Quality Assurance (Education and Training) (Amendment) Bill 2018 [Seanad]: Second Stage Dáil
- Qualifications and Quality Assurance (Education and Training) (Amendment) Bill 2018: Report and Final Stages Seanad
- Qualifications and Quality Assurance (Education and Training) (Amendment) Bill 2018: Committee Stage (Resumed) Seanad
- Qualifications and Quality Assurance (Education and Training) (Amendment) Bill 2018: Committee Stage Seanad
- Qualifications and Quality Assurance (Education and Training) (Amendment) Bill 2018: Order for Second Stage Seanad
- Qualifications and Quality Assurance (Education and Training) (Amendment) Bill 2018: Second Stage Seanad
- Qualifications and Quality Assurance (Education and Training) (Amendment) Act 2019
- An tAcht um Cháilíochtaí agus Dearbhú Cáilíochta (Oideachas agus Oiliúint) (Leasú), 2019
- As passed by Dáil Éireann
- As passed by Seanad Éireann
- As amended in Committee [Seanad Éireann]
- As Initiated
- Bill Digest
- Explanatory Memorandum