Principles for service user involvement in quality assurance of education programmes

On 12 November 2020, the Education and Training Committee discussed the draft Principles for service user involvement in quality assurance in education programmes. This discussion follows on from a decision in March 2020 that the Education Department should undertake a project to review lay visitor involvement in our education quality assurance processes.

In the November 2020 meeting (download the paper here), as well as reviewing the draft principles for service user involvement, the Committee discussed how the role of lay visitors would adapt towards service users providing their expertise based on their experience as a recipient of a registrants’ practise. They also discussed proposed changes to the lay visitor role to become a ‘service user expert advisor’.

Overall the Committee was supportive of the proposals outlined in the paper and agreed the draft principles, that these draft principles should be trailed through the pilot of the new quality assurance model, and that service users should be appointed as expert advisors. 

However, Committee also recognised the concerns expressed in the paper from lay visitors about their level of involvement in the processes. They discussed how we must ensure the involvement of service users going forward is not tokenistic and how we ensure this expert voice is heard so the value add is recognised. Reassurances were provided to the Committee about how service user involvement will be considered, and individuals consulted, as part of the development of the new quality assurance model.

As part of the development of the new quality assurance model, we will be running pilot events and be seeking lay visitor views on service user involvement and issues. This will include feedback on the whole model and specifically how service user views are integrated into it. Read more in the meeting papers.

Should you have any queries about this, please contact the Education Department on 020 7840 9724 or education@hcpc-uk.org