Ian Welch (International Quality Specialist, Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education, UK).
Ian Welch has accumulated over thirty years of teaching, management and leadership experience within the UK further education and higher education sector, around Vocational Education and Widening Participation. This experience reflects Ian’s enthusiasm and expertise around training and capacity building, instigation and development of Quality Assurance systems and enhancement of the Student learning experience.
Ian joined QAA thirteen years ago as an Assistant Director. He has recently led the development and delivery of a range of international capacity building initiatives and has worked closely with NAQA and the British Council in designing and delivering training for Experts and Trainers in Ukraine. Additionally, Ian has led training and consultation events in Mauritius, Morocco, Lebanon, UAE, Oman, Gibraltar, Egypt, Israel, Peru and Saudi Arabia, in liaison with local agencies and institutions.
Previously Ian has had key strategic responsibilities for several initiatives central to Quality Assurance of Higher Education in the UK, including leadership of the Teaching Excellence Framework and inaugural work around Higher Apprenticeship Review, working closely with the Office for Students and OFSTED. This builds on Ian’s leadership of a range of review methods at QAA, including Welsh Review (for Welsh institutions), Higher Education Review (for English institutions) and Integrated Quality Enhancement Review (for Colleges in England, Wales and Northern Ireland), and his management of enhancement projects across the UK, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and Pakistan.
Concurrent to his QAA role, Ian is Chair of Governors of a large comprehensive school and is active in Art and Design research and practice.
Before joining QAA, Ian worked in the sector as Executive Director in a large College. He studied at Manchester Metropolitan University, Central Lancashire University, Liverpool John Moore’s University and Leeds Becket University.