Computing – Page 97 – Computing & Digital Blog

Computing curriculum in Scotland

January 11, 2012 - Bobby - 3

You may have noticed the on-going debate in England about the ICT curriculum. There have been criticisms about what is taught in English schools, with complaints that it is boring and only focuses on using software rather than creating it. This morning the Minister for Education, Michael Gove, spoke about the problem at the BETT conference in London. He described the current offerings as “harmful and dull” and pledged to change the curriculum in England. Some people have claimed that…

Industrial Advisory Board

January 10, 2012 - Bobby - 0

I was invited to serve on the Industrial Advisory Board (IAB) for the School of Computing at the University of the West of Scotland (UWS). I attended my first meeting yesterday afternoon, held on the Paisley campus. The Board serves a similar purpose to the SQA Sector Panel in that it seeks feedback and advice from external people. But the IAB is huge. There are 44 members, representing 40 external bodies (now including SQA). There was a good turnout at…

Happy New Year

January 5, 2012 - Bobby - 0

The team returned to work today. We all had a nice, if wet and windy, holiday. Last year was a good year for the team. The main development was the HN Review, which culminated in the validation event for HNC Computing in December. We worked hard to develop and promote qualifications for markets outside of Scotland, and we hope that this will bear fruit during the coming year. The annual Heads of Computing event, held in early December, was also…

Christmas party

December 23, 2011 - Bobby - 0

We had our Christmas party yesterday. It began in the customary way, with a secret Santa in the office, before we headed off to the Merchant City for our Christmas lunch. Some of you may recognise Santa as the man who normally organises examinations in English. There are a few sore heads today, but everyone made it in to the office. We stop this afternoon until Thursday, 5 January. Thanks for taking the time to read the blog. Our readership has…

NC Computing: Technical Support Arrangements

December 19, 2011 - Bobby - 0

I noticed that the Arrangements for the new NC Computing: Technical Support are now available on the SQA website [PDF]. This qualification is offered at SCQF Levels 5 and 6. This new NC award is more technical than existing NC qualifications (such as NC Digital Media Computing) and better suited to progression to the more technical HN awards (such as HNC/D Computer Networking). This NC was developed by City of Glasgow College, with support from the NQGA team in SQA. Since…

Operational planning

December 14, 2011 - Bobby - 2

The team met this morning to discuss our plans for 2012-13. Every year each team in the Qualifications Development Directorate creates an operational plan, which describes the qualifications that we plan to revise or create in the coming year. I know that colleges do something similar, which is why we have the Heads of Computing event around this time of the year to help you create your plans. A number of awards are due their “quinquenial review”. We try to…

HNC Computing validation

December 12, 2011 - Bobby - 0

The validation event for the revised HNC Computing was held on Friday. The award was validated with some conditions. The development team was delighted with the outcome. It was a good event and the new award will benefit from the Validation Panel’s ideas. You can find out more about the validation event on the HN Review blog. Or contact Caroline for more information about the HN Review.

Awarding Body Forum

December 9, 2011 - Bobby - 1

I attended one of the quarterly Awarding Body Forum meetings yesterday, which was held in the OCR offices in Coventry. It wasn’t the best day for flying and my return flight into Glasgow featured in the national news. But I survived. These meetings are attended by awarding bodies from all corners of the UK, such as OCR, EdExcel, and BCS. The meeting is chaired by Chris Morrow of E-Skills UK. The agenda covered a range of topics such as ITQs…

NC Computer Games QDT

December 7, 2011 - Bobby - 0

The third meeting of the QDT for the new NC in Computer Games Development, at SCQF Level 6, took place today. The aim of today’s meeting was to brainstorm the contents of the new award. So there was lots of talking about the sort of things we want in the award. I began the meeting by congratulating Frank Duffy, of Motherwell College, for being elected the Lead Developer for this project. Of course, we don’t have a blank piece of…

Heads of Computing event

December 6, 2011 - Bobby - 0

The Heads of Computing event was held on Friday (2 December) but I’ve not had the chance to update the blog since then. These meetings have been taking place, every year, for a long time. I remember attending them when I was a Head of Department in the 1990’s. Computing is one of the few subject areas to continue with these events but I think that they still serve a purpose since they, effectively, summarise what’s been going on for the…