Higher Education Commission (HEC) is all set to launch "Vision 2025" during next month to set new targets in view of future academic requirements and to align the educational goals with the futuristic policies. "HEC with its prime focus on quality assurance and access to Higher Education is ensuring to bring the sector at par with the international standards and requirements", said Dr Mukhtar Ahmed, Chairman HEC while addressing a press conference on Wednesday.
To assess quality of universities' programmes, the HEC conducted review visits to various public and private sector universities, said Chairman HEC adding that a total of 293 PhD programmes and 57 M.Phil programmes of 171 universities were reviewed. He revealed that 31 PhD and 26 M.Phil programmes of different universities were closed down due to lack of fulfillment of minimum quality standards.
The HEC has stopped further intake in 56 PhD and 10 M.Phil programmes in various institutions for the same reason. "During the review process, the HEC teams primarily assessed whether or not the universities are following the Act they are operating on; are their statuary bodies in place, if they are abiding by structural guidelines, and also if they are following proper criteria for affiliations. The HEC has adopted world's best practices including soft reviews and hard reviews of university programmes after obtaining NoCs, he added.
"HEC is reviewing the market needs, acceptance level and relevance of various academic programmes and will launch new programmes or shelve some existing ones to cope with national requirements", said Chairman, adding that government has remarkably increased the budget of Higher Education Sector during the last three years and the Commission is dedicatedly developing Higher Education.
He said the HEC has been emphasizing on the involvement of professional accreditation bodies in launch and functionality of academic programmes. "We have agreed with all the accreditation councils not to issue conditional NoCs. HEC does not compromise on fulfillment of faculty requirements, curricula needs and overall quality", Chairman added.
He further said that three out of about 12 newly established institutions under the public-private partnership have been awarded NoC. He said the HEC will conduct review visits of university campuses in the second phase and, subsequently, of over 3000 colleges affiliated with various universities in the third phase.
Sharing details of plagiarism cases, the Chairman said that HEC has received 198 complaints since 2006, following which 160 cases were finalized. He said that 90 complaints were proved to be false while 38 faculty members were blacklisted. He said that 38 cases are under process and six cases are sub judice. The HEC will present a proposal to the Commission, HEC's governing body, that if a scholar commits plagiarism, his or her supervisor should also be blacklisted," he added.
Regarding opening of university campuses at district level, Dr Mukhtar said that new campuses of various universities have been launched in 29 districts, including 11 in Balochistan, five in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, six in Sindh and three in Gilgit-Baltistan, in the first phase while Higher Education Department, Punjab will soon provide the list. He said about 90 districts of the country are devoid of any university campus; however, the HEC will ensure access to Higher Education.
To a question, he said that the number of HEC scholars who avoid coming back to Pakistan after acquiring Higher Education has considerably dwindled. Such HEC scholars are seven to eight percent, he revealed. He said that the HEC research grant has been increased from around only Rs 46 million in 2002 to Rs 3 billion in 2016-17 while additional Rs 3 billion were allocated by the Planning Commission for research, innovation and technology transfer.
The Chairman said that the Commission is working on establishment of a Centre of Advanced Studies in Climate Change and it is going to hold a competition of universities to acquire this project. Dr Mukhtar Ahmad said emphasis is being laid on fields of study having significance in a particular area. He said marine sciences, human resource development and relevant studies will be introduced in the Gwadar University so that it can contribute to the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor Project (CPEC).
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