Industrialization and quality are synonymous words. To better comprehend their unification, let us first look at the history of the industrial revolutions, which may be classified as shown in the figure below.
The world is currently through the fourth industrial revolution, which has radically changed business models by creating conditions for greater flexibility and efficiency of resources. It provides various opportunities for companies to develop new technological models, services, and products.
Chronology of Industrialization :
- The first industrial revolution was characterized by steam-powered machines
- The second was characterized by electricity and assembly lines
- The third was characterized by innovations in computing and industrial automation
- The fourth industrial revolution is designing smart products through hyperconnected cyber-physical systems in environments where humans and machines cooperate to achieve goals and use mega data to generate value
The world presently is witnessing the fourth industrial revolution, which has dramatically altered business paradigms by enabling settings for increased resource flexibility and efficiency. It opens up several chances for businesses to create new technical models, services, and products.
Corollary to the revolution, Quality Assurance is a crucial topic on the agenda of the fourth industrial revolution, since traditional techniques of quality management are no longer sufficient, necessitating the implementation of new, creative quality management systems.
Implications of Fourth Industrial Revolution in Education:
Since the fourth Industrial Revolution is focused on the use of technology, educational institutions should centralize and use technology as a basis to preserve quality. At this point, any educational institution that does not instantly incorporate quality in its operations would be replaced, if not undermined, by current competition. As a result, the evolution of excellent education in the fourth industrial revolution is unavoidable.
Educational institutions should now be based on quality in providing customer education services and human resource development. Education institutions must continue to innovate to create excellence to be able to compete with competitors.
When we look at the quality of education or that of schools, it is supposed to be focused on the quality of the graduates or the pass-outs from the concerned school. Therefore, today’s qualified graduates must receive quality education which will benefit them during this industrial revolution. Therefore, the process of quality education must be supported by personnel, administrators, counsellor teachers, and quality and professional administration. This is also supported by educational facilities and adequate learning resources.
We can assure quality control by following the steps mentioned below :
- assessing the actual quality of the product
- comparing products with objectives, and
- differentiating between products and objectives
Relevant to quality control there are other important factors to be considered, which include:
- developing quality improvement infrastructure
- identifying certain areas that need improvement
- designing teamwork for quality improvement
- facilitating teams in quality improvement
In addition to the quality control steps, we also need to look at the revitalization of learning systems which includes:
- curriculum and character education
- information and communication technology-based learning materials
- entrepreneurship
- alignment, and
- evaluation
Quality control through the lens of educational units needs to look at the following :
- new school units and new classrooms
- other study rooms
- rehabilitation of classrooms
- student dormitories and teachers
- equipment, and
- school management and culture
Other components for quality management of the education process and improving student quality include providing scholarships to meritorious, talented, and outstanding students. Simultaneously, we must strengthen the aspects of educators and education professionals to increase total educational quality through training and development, certificates, and credentials.
However, developing these features in the educational system need a new movement to adapt to the fourth industrial revolution. We must concentrate on the new literacy movement, which is designed to concentrate on three primary literacies :
- Digital literacy,
- Technological literacy, and
- Human literacy, as these three abilities are projected to be essential in the future.
Digital literacy strives to improve the capacity to read, analyze, and apply information in a digital environment, whereas technology literacy seeks to provide an understanding of machinery and technology application, and human literacy aims to improve communication skills and master design knowledge.
The necessity for quality management in education is critical owing to developments in the fourth industrial revolution, and as we progress as a society, the education system must also progress to fulfil future requirements and compete with rivals.
