{"id":3431,"date":"2020-06-25T11:29:18","date_gmt":"2020-06-25T10:29:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.qualifications.gov.scot\/computing\/?p=3431"},"modified":"2020-06-25T11:51:10","modified_gmt":"2020-06-25T10:51:10","slug":"design-of-new-higher-national-awards","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.qualifications.gov.scot\/computing\/design-of-new-higher-national-awards\/","title":{"rendered":"Design of new Higher National awards"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Regular readers will know that we&#8217;re currently <a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.qualifications.gov.scot\/computing\/review-of-hnc-computing\/\">reviewing a suite of Higher National (HN) qualifications in Computing<\/a>. This isn&#8217;t a normal review. Computing is one of three subjects testing a new design for HN awards. The initiative is called &#8220;HN Next Generation&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>New Higher Nationals will have a different look to the current awards. The &#8220;design parameters&#8221; include:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>fewer and larger units<\/li>\n<li>less assessment<\/li>\n<li>inclusion of metaskills<\/li>\n<li>project-based learning.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>New Higher Nationals will have a consistent framework consisting of:<\/p>\n<ol>\n<li>Common core<\/li>\n<li>Sector specific<\/li>\n<li>Industry specific<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p>We&#8217;re looking at every aspect of the qualifications including our approach to grading, the way we define units and the way we write qualification descriptions.<\/p>\n<p>The plan is to create three prototype qualifications (in Broadcasting, Computing and Engineering) and try these out with some centres next year. We&#8217;ll use what we learn to roll out new HNs in every subject area.<\/p>\n<p>We&#8217;ve made a lot of progress in Computing. A Qualification Development Team (QDT) has been formed and <a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.qualifications.gov.scot\/computing\/first-meeting-of-the-development-team-for-hnc-computing\/\">met a couple of times<\/a>. Lead developers <a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.qualifications.gov.scot\/computing\/lead-developers-for-hn-next-gen\/\">have been selected<\/a>. We&#8217;re working with the leads to develop prototype frameworks for all five Computing awards (HNC Computing, HND Computer Science, HND Data Science, HND Networking &amp; Infrastructure and HND Software Development).<\/p>\n<p>The QDT has over 30 members &#8212; representing every key partner including colleges, schools, universities and employers. There is a great deal of enthusiasm for the proposed changes.<\/p>\n<p>Please <a href=\"mailto:helen.zhang@sqa.org.uk\">contact Helen<\/a> if you want to know more about this development.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Regular readers will know that we&#8217;re currently reviewing a suite of Higher National (HN) qualifications in Computing. This isn&#8217;t a normal review. Computing is one of three subjects testing a new design for HN awards. The initiative is called &#8220;HN Next Generation&#8221;. New Higher Nationals will have a different look to the current awards. The &#8220;design parameters&#8221; include: fewer and larger units less assessment inclusion of metaskills project-based learning. New Higher Nationals will have a consistent framework consisting of: Common&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.qualifications.gov.scot\/computing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3431"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.qualifications.gov.scot\/computing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.qualifications.gov.scot\/computing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.qualifications.gov.scot\/computing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.qualifications.gov.scot\/computing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3431"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.qualifications.gov.scot\/computing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3431\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3434,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.qualifications.gov.scot\/computing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3431\/revisions\/3434"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.qualifications.gov.scot\/computing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3431"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.qualifications.gov.scot\/computing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3431"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.qualifications.gov.scot\/computing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3431"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}