Context:
Govt plans accreditation system overhaul for higher educational institutes by December
Radhakrishnan Committee:
- Constituted in – 2022
- Objective – For strengthening the Assessment & Accreditation processes in Higher Education Institutions.
Recommendations –
| Key Recommendations | Present Scenario |
| Suggested Binary Accreditation System under which institutes would be certified as “Accredited” or “Not Accredited” | At present, NAAC follows an eight-point grading system under which institutes are rated A++, A+, A, B++, B+, B, C and D |
| Maturity-Based Graded Accreditation to encourage accredited institutions to raise their bar and continuously improve from ‘Level 1’ to ‘Level 5’ as Institutions of Global Excellence | No mechanism for Leveled Accreditation |
| One Nation, One Data platform for handling the varied data collected from institutes | Institutes are required to submit a large amount of paper-work to apply for accreditation. |
| Proposed subsuming the National Institutional Ranking Framework (NIRF) under NAAC | No one overarching agency for accrediting institutes and courses |
| IITs should be brought under the ambit of NAAC (National Accreditation Council) | At present IITs follow their internal systems for periodic peer evaluation and assessment of programmes. |
| Accreditation based on inputs received from a set of audience that may include students, faculty, staff, alumni, official visitors etc. | Based on inspections by teams of experts |
National Accreditation Council (NAAC):
- Established in – 1994
- Status – Autonomous body funded by the University Grants Commission (UGC).
- Headquarters – Bangalore.
- Mandate – Making quality assurance an integral part of the functioning of Higher Education Institutions (HEIs).
- Composition – Has a General Council (GC) and Executive Committee (EC)
- Chairperson of the UGC is the President of the General Council of the NAAC.
- Paramarsh – A UGC scheme to mentor National Accreditation and Assessment Council (NAAC) accreditation aspirant institutions for promoting quality assurance in higher education.
Source: The Indian Express
Previous Year Question
‘SWAYAM’, an initiative of the Government of India, aims at:
[UPSC Civil Service Exam – 2016 Prelims]
(a) promoting the Self Help Groups in rural areas
(b) providing financial and technical assistance to young start-up entrepreneurs
(c) promoting the education and health of adolescent girls
(d) providing affordable and quality education to the citizens for free
Answer: (d)
