Educational Governance shares characteristics with clinical governance, staff governance and other aspects of health service management. Governance is usually achieved through a framework approach comprising standards, processes and reporting structures.
Following this approach, NES has defined Educational Governance as:
The systems and standards through which organisations control their educational activities and demonstrate accountability for continuous improvement of quality and performance.
The central purpose of the Educational Governance Framework is to ensure that all NES educational programmes are accountable for their quality and performance. The framework guidance in relation to standards states the following
‘NES and partner organisations use standards and criteria to express the quality required of educational initiatives and activities. In several contexts these standards are set by external bodies, such as healthcare profession regulators (e.g. Health Care Professions Council) and the Quality Assurance Agency’s Quality Code for Higher Education. In other cases, standards are developed by NES programme teams according to the specific requirements of educational projects. Educational quality management processes involve the application of informed judgements about compliance with external and NES educational standards’.