HEC takes steps to improve education

Plans to evaluate 300 colleges for minimum standards.

ISLAMABAD:

The top education regulatory body seems to be trying to keep moving its work forward, or in this case, downward. It is now all set to address issues around education quality in the affiliated colleges of various universities.

The Higher Education Commission (HEC) has planned to evaluate 300 affiliated colleges on the minimum quality standards (MQS) criteria.

The commission has previously been criticised as many universities, particularly in central Punjab were known to grant affiliations while compromising on quality.

According to an HEC official, last year, one of the universities disaffiliated hundreds of colleges in Punjab for not meeting minimum standards, and soon after, another university did the same.

HEC Academics Director General Fida Hussain shared that in the recent past they have evaluated 100 colleges and will evaluate 300 more in 2014.

HEC’s Dr Zahid Majeed said that the evaluation process will be carried out from March 17 to April 15. “Universities must have an effective monitoring mechanism to ascertain that colleges meet affiliation requirements,” he said.

Highlighting the importance of MQS, he said HEC had developed the document to carry out an objective assessment of affiliated colleges in accordance with the guideline.

The MQS set benchmarks in academic programmes and their evaluation, students’ admission, physical infrastructure, academic facilities and learning resources, governance and financial management, research, public disclosure, transparency, community links and outreach.

Published in The Express Tribune, March 12^th, 2014.