Accreditation UK's response to Covid-19

The following is a statement from the chairs of the Accreditation UK Board and manager of Accreditation UK

The Coronavirus (Covid-19) pandemic has put many of you under a great deal of pressure. We know that you need to prioritise the health of students and staff at this difficult time.

To reduce additional pressure and non-essential travel, we are postponing the planned inspection schedule and the pre-inspection briefings until further notice.  Once the peak disruption is passed and the sector starts to recover we will phase in the inspections again. Each accreditation will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis, doing what we can to help you return to normal as soon as conditions allow, including initially doing partial, remote or virtual inspections before restarting site visits.

• Accredited centres retain their status during this time, including if your centre has to close for a period due to pandemic in the coming weeks or months.
• When resuming accreditation inspections, we will prioritise inspections for new applicants and those centres whose accreditation is suspended or under review in order to minimise the impact on future recruitment.
• We will contact pre-inspection briefing participants concerning alternative arrangements to ensure that centres have opportunities to receive briefings ahead of an inspection taking place.

We are working closely with English UK to understand and support the sector at this uncertain time. To avoid information overload, we are not providing separate Coronavirus briefings to language centres, accommodation providers or agents.

Please continue to check the NHS guidance  and refer to the useful links and advice on the English UK website to help you manage your centre's response.

Our thoughts are with all our ELT colleagues facing difficult decisions in these exceptional circumstances.