QUALITY INDICATORS FOR SNE

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The National Institute for Quality and Evaluation (INCE) is the state entity responsible for general evaluation of the education system at the non-university level education. Its fundamental purpose is to provide relevant information to the Education Authorities and to citizens as to the degree to which the education system reaches stated goals at a specific moment of its endeavour.

The duties of this body are to:  assess the degree to which the core curricula are mastered at the various levels, cycles and grades of the education system; carry out research, studies and evaluations regarding the system; assess the general reforms of the system, as well as the structure, effectiveness and efficiency of the system; draw up a state system of indicators which will allow for evaluating the degree of effectiveness and efficiency of the system; draw up assessment systems for the different types of education and their corresponding establishments; provide and interchange information with the Education Authorities to facilitate decision-making; inform the various sectors of society as to the functioning and outcomes of the education system; and publish and disseminate the results of assessments carried out, as well as of innovations occurring in the field of assessment. The INCE is likewise responsible for proposing initiatives and suggestions that may contribute to quality and improvement in education and state co-ordination in international studies.

The assessment units of the various Autonomous Communities collaborate with the INCE in the different assessment activities of the education system, and are responsible for carrying out an assessment of the education system within their territory.

Assessment of educational establishments is of a dual nature: internal assessment carried out by the education community itself; and external assessment which is carried out by specialists in assessment, normally by the Education Technical Inspection. In any case, the Autonomous Communities are responsible for drawing up and implementing assessment plans in territories under their management. All of these plans are found to have the same objective and basic characteristics.

Quality principles

The quality principles within the education system are:

- Equity, which guarantees the quality of equal opportunities for a learner’s complete personality development throughout education, within democratic principles respect, and fundamental rights and liberties.

-  The capacity of transmitting values which foster personal freedom, the social responsibility, cohesion and the improvement of society and equal rights between sexes, which help to overcome any type of discrimination, and also the practice of solidarity, to support the civic participation of pupils in voluntary activities.

-  The capacity of acting as a personal and social compensative element

-  The participation of the various actors of the education community, in the field of its corresponding competences and responsibilities, in the development of the school activity in the schools, fostering, especially, the necessary environment of live together and study.(??)

- The conception of education as a permanent process, which is important throughout life.

- The consideration of the responsibility and effort as essential elements of the educational process.

-  The flexibility in order to adapt its structure and organization to the changes, needs and society demands, and to the different abilities, interests, expectations and personality in the pupils.

- The recognition of the teaching function as an essential factor of the quality of the education, stated in the attention given to the teachers’ training, actualisation, and to their professional promotion.

- The pupils’ capacity to trust in their own abilities and knowledge, developing creativity, personal initiative, enterprising spirit, and basic principles and values.

- The fostering and promotions of the investigation, the experimentation and the educational innovation.

- The assessment and the educational system inspection as a whole, both in its design and organization, and in the teaching and learning processes.

- The schools efficiency, through their autonomy reinforcement and the school management fostering.