What is a Sports Massage Qualification Level?

The past two weeks have been somewhat interesting, as I discovered that the external examiners, who were set to be the provider of independent exams for my massage courses, was not QCA recognised.
Nightmare !! Without QCA, the Sports Massage Association wont recognise a qualification..... or will they ?
I'll go into that later .........
However
Never let it be said that I stand still when confronted by a challenge !

Over the past two weeks I have gone from a standing start nowing virtually nothing about National Occupational Frameworks, the QCA, or levels of NVQ, or providers of accreditation such as Edecel, OCR, and NVQ's.

WHAT A MINE FIELD !
WOW what a DISCOVERY about the SPORTS MASSAGE ASSOCIATION 's OWN FLAGSHIP COURSE provided by SPS Ltd.

OK, so the good news is that April 15th is the day for completion with my external QCA appraisers to be able to run the Active IQ level 3 Sports Massage Course. Recognised by the SMA as a level 3 membership, although the number of training hours is far greater than ITEC or VCTC courses.

However, what ACTUALLY consitutes a level 4 membership is somewhat interesting.

Why?

Well a discussion last week with Kay, at the Oxford & Cambridge Board gave me some very interesting information.

The SPS course in Sports Massage which the SMA promote and accept as a level 4, was set up as a Headway Course ( whatever that is) and DOES NOT HAVE ANY QCA RECOGNISED STANDARD

Look at the site, and see there is NO QCA Badge  !!!!! It's very interesting because the course details actually read "The course is validated by Oxford, Cambridge         and RSA Examinations"....... BUT that doesn't give it a level, its not QCA recognized. This despite the fact that the SMA say they set the standards in sports massage.

OH REALLY !!!!!

As Kay at the OCR put it " It doesn't have a badge " Meaning it doesn't have a level

She described is as just a course run by one centre, and not a level. OCR just do the exams, but provide no guarantee that it is a level of qualification

NOT A LEVEL

SO fancy that, the SMA are promoting a course leading to membership at level 4, and the course they are accrediting is not QCA recognised, although they demand courses that people take to become members ARE QCA recognised.

The OCR exam is not a level  !!!!

SO
BUYER BEWARE !
Check that YOUR training provider is QCA recognised.

My ACTIVE IQ course includes 180 face to face hours study, and the SPS course is shorter...... at 150 hours  .........explain that if you can
I am waiting to hear back from the SMA, and will keep you posted.