Re: [Fsfe-uk] qualifications

[Ian Lynch]

> That is a totally different ballpark.  Yes, people like rewards, and
> shiny medals they can use in their peer group for a while, and it can
> motivate them to do the course.  But how many people put on their CV
> what Boy Scout badges they got?

It's part of a continuum. I'm looking at the whole
assessment/qualifiactions picture and its many purposes, you are looking
at snapshots in areas I assume you are important to you.

>   How many people even remember what Boy
> Scout badges they got?  The certificates you're talking about now are
> personal confirmations that they did the work and achieved a standard,
> that sort of certificate doesn't have to have any external backing or
> relevance outside the context of that course.

Its just one aspect of certification. The balance of importance can vary
widely even with the same qualification in individual contexts. eg I
know people that have done PhDs simply because they can use the title
Dr. That is just boy scout badges for grown ups. A boy scout first aid
badge can result in someone saving someone else's life. While a person
can have a personal confirmation a lot want external approval even if it
is not strictly speaking necessary. The whole thing is very complex and
there are more grey areas than absolutes apart from in a minority of
very specific fields. If someone does an INGOT certificate they will
know more about FOSS and have ICT skills in line with the assessment
criteria. They won't have any guaranteed skills in any particular
application beyond these and indeed that is intentional. At that stage
we want background transferable skills and knowledge and to attract the
widest possible audience.

> > In the free software world attribution is similar. Why does RMS want
> > people to refer to GNU/Linux? To recognise the work of GNU. That is not
> > much different to certificating GNU in recognition of its contribution
> > to GNU/Linux.
> 
> Yes, it is.  Calling something GNU+Linux is a long way from having the
> IEEE certifying it as a recognised platform for the industry. 

About as far as boy scout badges from PhDs perhaps but all different
aspects of recognition and motivation. The word qualification is pretty
broad in its meaning and what motivates people to take up qualifications
is highly variable. That's all I'm saying. You are focussing on
accreditation and quality assurance in a specific set of contexts which
is an important aspect but not the only one. If the aim is to raise
awareness of FOSS in as wide a population as possible, the design of the
qualification is totally different from certifying competence in a
particular application. Both come under the broad heading of
qualifications and are different rather than better or worse.

>  POSIX,
> for instance, has that certification, and there it means something
> because it is certified as a standard that everyone who calls their
> system "POSIX compliant" can depend on.  SAying that a system is
> "GNU+Linux" means very little, you can have a GNU+Linux system with most
> of the utilities missing, the configuration in strange places, and
> looking totally unfamiliar.
> 
> Of course, that's yet another digression from the type of certificaion
> being talked about before...

I'm trying (obviously without much success :-) ) to get people to
understand the broader aspect of how qualifications are used both in
the wider educational sense and for quality assurance in business
applications and the fact that there is considerable overlap. I guess it
is rather like you trying to explain anything of complexity where you
have a specific area of expertise with the constraints of a mailing
list ;-)

> > Of course in the UK you can say we have gone over-board and the
> > regulations that have sprung up around certification negate the quality
> > of learning eg assessment by inappropriate end testing or on computers
> > because it might be cheaper. Valid testing is a big issue in my view
> > because we tend to set tests that are cheap and appear accurate not
> > tests that necessarily validate the intended learning and support the
> > quality of learning. But this is detail related to reforming the system
> > rather than scrapping it entirely.
> 
> Not necessarily.  There comes a point where the best thing to do is to
> scrap everything and redo it from the start properly.  

When I say scrapping it entirely I mean removing all forms of
qualifications for ever.  I don't believe that is remotely possible. If
you are not talking about that but changing the way qualifications are
structured and delivered (whether from a zero base or not) you are
talking about reform. That then gets very complex because there are an
infinite number of options. Translating educational theory into practice
is notoriously difficult because you we are dealing with individual
human emotions not just rational logic. Most people use their own
personal experience to devise their theories without realising most
other people will not react to the changes the same way that they would.

Ian
-- 
New QCA Accredited IT Qualifications
www.theINGOTs.org

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