ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the complex business of legitimising work-based learning in universities. It is the hard wiring' required to assure the quality and standards of university degrees in the interests of the public. In particular, it focuses on the recent developments of the Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education (QAA), national skills policy initiatives and public funding challenges regarding work-based learning being delivered in the UK. It is important to have some understanding of this because the QAA effectively determines the climate for the universities to operate their qualifications which in turn impacts on the forms of delivery, curriculum and relationships of those awards. In this chapter, the process is referred to as validation, although the universities themselves may use other terms. Since 2000, validation has been guided by the QAA Academic Infrastructure (AI) and in particular, the Code of Practice for the Assurance of Academic Quality and Standards which covers programme design, approval, monitoring and review.
