QAU body advises against offering 4-year programme this year

Affiliates want to launch courses next month, approach VC

ISLAMABAD: Even as university affiliates in the capital mull plans to launch four-year bachelor’s degree programmes, a committee at the Quaid-i-Azam University (QAU) has recommended that the programme’s launch should be delayed by a year.

Colleges, though, have insisted they are allowed to launch the programmes early.

As many as 15 colleges in the Islamabad Capital Territory plan to offer the four-year graduate programmes in various subjects as early as the upcoming academic sessions which commence next month.



The new four-year Bachelor of Studies (BS) programme will replace the traditional two-year Bachelors of Arts (BA), Bachelors of Science (BSc) and Bachelors of Commerce (BCom) programmes in line with guidelines of the Higher Education Commission (HEC) to do so by 2018. The HEC also plans to phase out the two-year Masters of Arts (MA) and Masters of Science (MSc) programmes by 2020.

Colleges in the capital have been working for the last six months to prepare for the programme.

A committee consisting of varsity and college officials was constituted to finalise modalities and recommend to the academic council a final decision.

The committee in its last meeting told QAU authorities that it would be prudent to defer implementation of the programme for a year since not all of the affiliated colleges have routed their four-year courses through the respective faculties of QAU.

Every discipline at QAU has a board of studies which have been formally approved by the academic council. Each new academic programme has to be approved by the respective board of studies first.

Moreover, some colleges intend to offer both types of programmes simultaneously for one more year, such as the two-year BA, BSc, BCom programmes along with the four-year BS programme since it is not easy to completely switch all the programmes over to another format at once. However, officials at the QAU insist that it not possible to run offer both programmes at the same time, especially in the same subjects.

The committee also recommended offering the programme per the semester system.



While the academic council of the QAU has yet to take a final decision on the matter, officials say in the wake of recommendations of the preliminary committee, it is unlikely that the academic council would allow colleges to launch the programme without following procedures.

Meanwhile, representatives of these colleges have also met with QAU Vice Chancellor Dr Javed Ashraf, urging him to intervene in the matter and to help get the four-year programmes off the ground this year.

Dr Ashraf, in turn, designated Professor Waseem Ahmad as the focal person to look into the report.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 14^th, 2017.