Approved BASC DSC 1 Trainers

[willie_gunn]

From the BASC website:-
Top five services offered by the shooting standards team

1. To set, develop and maintain standards in all areas of shooting

Peter,

could you tell us how many standards have been set to date, and what they are?

For goodness sake!

From the BASC website: BASC - Codes of Practice

Please let's not start a whole new pedantic thread on the difference between a standard and a code of practice

Rarely have I read a thread which reflects so badly on the whole sorry saga of training and the practitioners thereof.

willie_gunn

 

[Tom_Ov]

Jon,

I am a keen supporter of the DSC (and a current memeber of BASC) and would love to be able to completely support your statement as that is the way it probably should be - but I regret I cannot, as it isn't.

I recently had cause to investigate this matter in some detail. As context - I am an Educational Consultant, working for a large Systems Integrator. I was tasked with looking at Awarding Bodies by a Government Department who wish to standardise and centralise data produced from AB's to ensure standards, quality and ease of authentication of qualifications for students and employers alike. As a keen deer stalker, I thought I would look at 'our' qualification position as it was one of the more simple ones to use as a case study - or so I thought.

DMQ are the awarding body in this case. They happen to be almost wholly owned by BASC and be managed by BASC staff - but BASC are only one of the Approved Assessment Centres of DMQ (- the remainder BTW, all sit on the board of DMQ - work that one out!). It would seem there are no DMQ approved Training Centres as this would be contrary to the task they have set themselves (of managing the qualification) and the openness of the qualification. I wrote to DMQ to ask about the process of becoming an Assessment Centre and howthe quality standard in Assessment Centres was maintained - and was told to mind my own business. I wrote again and was told there was no process and that there was no room for any additional Assessment Centres and the management of quality was an internal issue. In the absence of any open process and a lock down by the system, what conclusions should I be drawing from this? Complete confidence in an open system where the Assessment is accountable as a minimum to those who take the qualification?

There would appear to be some confusion here around BASC as a training provider, BASC as an Assessment Centre and BASC as an independent information hub for its members and the sport in general - these aspects, while implicitly linked should be treated as separate entities. There are several training companies, not on the list as mentioned, who use the BASC Assessment Centre. Others will doubtless use other Assessment Centres. As such, I'm not sure of the benefit of being approved by one of the Assessment Centres, nor do I believe it is in BASC's gift to approve training centres or otherwise in the manner in which this comes across - it may well be able to recommend them to its membership, but there is surely a conflict of interest here - as highlighted by Apache in an earlier post.

I think ETR puts this very well. I'm not involved in any aspect of DMQ accreditation or delivery. However, I do have some experience of designing and assessing training and accreditation policies and systems.

The relationship between BASC (who do a lot of great work) and DMQ can be perceived as being unclear and less than transparent. The reality may or may not reflect this but perception in these cases is all. If DMQ aspires to offer a well respected 'qualification' which has value, then this issue of transparency surely needs to be addressed? If not, then as various government departments cast around for a benchmark against which minimum standards in deer management can be assesed, then DMQ will not be deemed to be sufficiently robust and another qualification will be developed and adopted to fill the gap in the market.

That would be a great shame.

 

[willie_gunn]

The relationship between BASC (who do a lot of great work) and DMQ can be perceived as being unclear and less than transparent. The reality may or may not reflect this but perception in these cases is all. If DMQ aspires to offer a well respected 'qualification' which has value, then this issue of transparency surely needs to be addressed? If not, then as various government departments cast around for a benchmark against which minimum standards in deer management can be assesed, then DMQ will not be deemed to be sufficiently robust and another qualification will be developed and adopted to fill the gap in the market.

That would be a great shame.

Tom

According to DMQ's website, "Administration support for DMQ is provided by the BASC at Marford Mill - see Contact Us . Assessment materials for DSC1 are maintained and supplied by the BDS."

So does that mean that the relationship between BDS and DMQ is similarly "unclear and less than transparent"?

If not, please explain where this lack of transparency arises from, other than Eric the Red's incorrect statement that DMQ is "almost wholly owned by BASC and be managed by BASC staff" ?

willie_gunn

 

[Tom_Ov]

Dominic

I think that the relationship between BASC and DMQ can be perceived as being unclear and less than transparent because;

They are based in the same building.
Admin support for DMQ is provided by BASC staff.

The relationship between DMQ and BDS at least appears to be more transparent, simply because of the geographical distance between the two organisations and because BDS do nor provide administrative support to DMQ.

If I were assessing DMQ's accreditation processes, I would want to know:

What the staff structure at DMQ is.
What the broader governance structure at DMQ is
Who sits on the DMQ quality assurance group (see http://www.dmq.org.uk/about.htm )
Who are the DMQ external verifiers.
How DMQ Assessment centres are licenced and audited.

I'm not suggesting a huge conspiracy here, rather that in a world where there is an increasing likelihood that there will be a requirement for those wishing to shoot deer to hold a basic qualification, it would be good if the body accrediting the current industry standard could demonstrate that it had robust independent processes.

Tom