QA In eLearning – How Important Is It?

Have you ever bought anything that isn’t tested for quality; even something intangible? So, would anyone really buy “education” before assuring a quality check? Nonetheless, before talking about the quality assurance in eLearning, let’s first see what the term “quality” actually means.

To put in simple words, it is “a measure of excellence/perfection or a state of being free from defects, deficiencies and significant variations of a product.” It is achieved by strict and consistent commitment to certain standards that achieve uniformity of a product in order to satisfy specific customer or user requirements.

Today, the competitive online training landscape is expanding and so is the importance of eLearning. It is essential that you listen to learners and consistently find ways to improve learning experiences. And this makes “Quality Assurance/Testing” a very integral and indispensable part of the eLearning industry.

The quality analysts in the eLearning industry not only act as filters but are also responsible for enhancing the quality of the course. For this, the quality analysts are involved right from the requirement gathering or requirement analysis phase.

Role of Quality Analysts in eLearning

• Quality Analysts have to mainly check the content and the functionality of a course.
  • Testing content entails checking whether the content is as per the inputs sent by the client and as per the storyboard
  • Testing functionality entails checking whether the course behaves correctly in all technical environments
• Testing on Multiple Devices
  • In this type of testing, a course is checked on all platforms and all devices (mobile, ipad, iphone, desktop, etc.)
• Browser testing/Compatibility testing
  • The course is to be tested on all operating systems and browsers (both portrait and landscape views)
• Localization
  • In eLearning, there are many courses which are developed in several languages. Here, it is necessary to check whether the language is translated correctly
  • Also, testing is carried out to check the quality of the product for a particular locale
• User Interface testing
  • Checking designs and branding guidelines
  • Checking spellings
  • Checking labels of objects with respect to their functionality
  • Checking alignments

So this is, in short, the role of Quality Analysts in eLearning. But why is it necessary? What is the importance of Quality Assurance?

Importance

It is said, “It is not sufficient to demonstrate that the software is doing what it is supposed to do, but it is also important to demonstrate whether the software is not doing what it is not supposed to do”.

Quality Analysts verify and validate all the aspects of the developed course to ensure;

• that it works as expected
• that it works according to the technical requirements and
• that it works consistently and predictably

They have a “test to break” attitude and have “judgmental skills” which assesses high risk areas of an application and more focus is kept on those areas.

Quality Analysis is important since it helps in enhancing the learner experience. It ensures the quality of a product in terms of requirements, delivery schedule, and service.

Conclusion

So we can summarize by saying that “Quality in a service or product is not what you put into it. It is what the customer gets out of it”. Thus, ultimately Quality Analysis helps in achieving the satisfaction and appreciation of the customer.

This article was contributed by the QA team at Aims Digital.