Alliance of Credential Evaluation Services of Canada (ACESC)
Evaluating Excellence
References
General Guiding Principles for Good Practice in the Assessment of Foreign Credentials
The Lisbon Recognition Convention and documents adopted under the Convention
The Alliance: a short historical background
The Alliance was founded in 1999 in response to the rapidly growing demand for reliable, high quality, and portable assessments of educational credentials. Its founding members were: the International Credential Evaluation Service (British Columbia), the International Qualifications Assessment Service (Alberta), the Service des équivalences d'études (Quebec) – now the Centre d'expertise sur les formations acquises hors du Québec –, and the Canadian Information Centre for International Credentials (CICIC). Together, these services and CICIC collaborated to define the quality assurance framework for the Alliance. CICIC provides the secretariat support for the Alliance and currently serves as an ex-officio member.
The formation of the Alliance was an outcome of the groundwork laid by the Provincial Assessment Committee (PAC) from 1996-1999. PAC was made up of representatives of the above agencies; additionally, observers from the Ontario Ministry of Citizenship, Culture, and Recreation and the Manitoba Ministry of Culture, Heritage and Citizenship participated in the PAC discussions. The PAC developed “General Guiding Principles for Good Practice in the Assessment of Foreign Credentials” in 1998. This document guided the development of the broader pan-Canadian quality assurance framework of the Alliance.
The Alliance Framework was developed by PAC in recognition of:
- the need to promote fair, credible, and standardized methods in the assessment of foreign credentials
- the need for consistency among the jurisdictions in the assessment of foreign credentials
- the importance of the portability of educational evaluations across jurisdictions
- the importance of articulating a conceptual framework for the assessment of foreign credentials to promote consistency
- the advantages of working collaboratively to address issues related to the assessment of foreign credentials
PAC members also recognized the importance of linking principles developed in Canada to models of good practice developed in other parts of the world, notably the “Recommendations on the General Procedures and Criteria for the Evaluation of Foreign Qualifications” developed by the Council of Europe and UNESCO in the context of the 1997 Lisbon Recognition Convention.
While working on its Quality Assurance Framework, the Alliance linked with representatives from the Federal-Provincial-Territorial Working Group on Access to Professions and Trades, which has since been disbanded, to discuss issues related specifically to the evaluation of foreign credentials. The main objectives of this forum were to provide suggestions and advice to the Alliance, to assist in promoting portability of assessments, and to facilitate information dissemination and exchange.