The Higher Education Commission (HEC) has approved a new criterion for the affiliation of public and private colleges with universities and degree awarding institutions.
The HEC has numbers of decision in its ninth meeting held here with Advisor to Prime Minister for Science and Technology and HEC Chairman Professor Dr Atta-ur-Rehamn in the chair for the promotion of quality education particularly at higher level.
The meeting also endorsed the criteria for approval of journals to be recognised by the HEC and constituted a sub-committee for preparing a list Commission approved periodical according to the criteria, approved by the Commission. The sub-committee was directed to submit its recommendations at the earliest.
The meeting appreciated the report of the sub-committee, which was constituted by Dr Atta-ur-Rehamn to review and evaluate the existing M.Phil and Ph.D. programmes of the universities.
It directed the HEC to obtain clear timeframe from degree awarding institutes by which they could improve and come at par with the prescribed standard of the HEC in terms of faculty, infrastructure, laboratories, qualification, admission procedures, course conduct and examination.
The meeting directed that release of funds to the non-compliant public sector universities and degree awarding institutions should be curtailed immediately.
It asked the HEC to initiate a programme for approval of departments of universities where Ph.D. studies could be offered according to the set criteria to bring our Ph.D. studies at par with world class degrees.
These criteria, the meeting noted, were developed after extensive consultation with all the stakeholders by the Quality Assurance Committee constituted by the HEC.
Those who attended the meeting are Planning Commission Deputy Chairman Dr M. Akram Sheikh, Ministry of Science and Technology Acting Secretary Shehryar Khan, UET Lahore vice-chancellor Lieutenant General Muhammad Akram Khan (Retd), QAU Islamabad vice-chancellor Professor Dr Qasim Jan, Rector Lahore School of Economic, Lahore Dr Shahid Amjad Chaudhry, Higher Education Punjab Special Secretary Nazir Saeed, COSTECH Islamabad Adviser Science Dr Anwar Nasim, Peshawar University Ex-VC Professor Abdul Matin, Council of Islamic Ideology, Pakistan Ex-member Professor Dr Saadia Chishti, Panjwani Foundation and Trusts Karachi Chairperson Nadira Panjwani, Unitech Electronic (pvt) Ltd Lahore Chief Executive Shahzad Alam and HEC Executive Director Dr S. Sohail H. Naqvi.