Assuring quality

Area of Science:

• Dental Education
• Quality Assurance in Higher Education
• E-learning Assessment

Background:

• Educational institutions strive for high standards in content and teaching.
• Agencies like QAA and GDC set frameworks for dental education quality.
• Monitoring quality in dental schools and professional training is crucial.

Purpose of the Study:

• To describe quality assurance frameworks in dental education.
• To examine quality assessment techniques for dental programs and courses.
• To review the development of quality assessment for distance learning in dentistry.

Main Methods:

• Review of established quality assurance frameworks (QAA, GDC).
• Analysis of quality issues in program/course development and assessment techniques.
• Exploration of student roles in quality assessment.
• Examination of progress in distance learning quality assessment.

Main Results:

• Quality assurance frameworks are in place for dental education.
• Current quality assessment methods are broadly applied to general education.
• The assessment of e-learning quality in dentistry is nascent.

Conclusions:

• Existing quality assurance models are largely general.
• Specific assessment tools for e-learning in dentistry require further development.
• The field of e-learning quality assessment in dentistry is emerging.