NextGen: HN - Quality Assurance

Effective quality assurance maintains the integrity of our qualifications by ensuring assessment decisions are valid, reliable, practicable, equitable and fair.

For Next Generation Higher National (NextGen: HN) qualifications, we have introduced a supportive, ongoing and progressive process of external quality assurance, while continuing to confirm that standards are being met and maintained in assessment practice.

To support centres, we allocate a named external quality assurer (EQA) for each NextGen: HN qualification being delivered. EQAs engage with course teams and internal quality assurance staff at the beginning of each session and regularly throughout the year to provide support with assessment design, delivery and decision-making as it happens.

We quality assure NextGen: HN qualifications on a ‘whole qualification’ basis, instead of unit driven basis, and we continue to measure them against our existing quality assurance criteria.

You can find an overview of the full qualification verification criteria in our Qualification Verification Criteria: Guidance for centres.

You can find more detailed information on our quality assurance approach in the guidance below:

Next Generation: Higher National Quality Assurance – Guidance for centres (426 KB)

SQA Academy module

Explore our new approach to quality assurance in the following short module. 

NextGen: HN quality assurance module