Higher education institutions (HEIs) in Pakistan need to focus more on quality improvement, hence they should complete academic reviews of departments and faculties and design incentives for outstanding faculty members, suggests a World Bank report.
In a higher education policy note, prepared by the Human Development Sector for South Asia region recently, it was recommended to establish a mechanism for regular review and continuous improvement of curriculum; develop an assessment mechanism for students learning and develop education management information systems.
THE REPORT SUGGESTS THAT ACCREDITATION AND QUALITY ASSURANCE PROGRAMMES SHOULD BE STRENGTHENED THROUGH FOLLOWING ACTIONS:
-- Setting up high national standards for institutional accreditation through consultation with the HEIs and professional communities.
-- Reviewing the proposed process and human resources required to effectively implement accreditation, including additional resources for the QAA, QECs, and the councils.
-- Organising large-scale training for reviewers, accreditation councils, and university staff on institutional accreditation.
-- Establishing a mechanism to ensure the quality and effectiveness of the accreditation process by making the QAA and the councils autonomous in the long run and the HEC as the accreditor of the accreditors.
The medium-term development framework (MTDF) focuses exclusively on universities, degree awarding institutions (DAIs) and centres of excellence (CoEs), and does not include measures to deal with the poor quality of pre-university and college education. Yet, the universities cannot be ring-fenced and insulated from their natural partners in the education stage.
As the quality at these levels of education has a major impact on the quality of students at the higher education level, it should receive adequate attention from all parties involved. Therefore, close collaboration among the HEC, the provincial authorities and the Ministry of Education is essential in establishing mechanisms required to improve quality at all levels, including the teacher education.
According to report, the governance and management weaknesses had hampered the HEIs' efforts to perform and academic excellence to flourish. Likewise, ineffective governance, management structures and practices are among the most serious challenges to the proposed overall changes in the MTDF.
Weak leadership in the HEIs is common as exemplified as the vice chancellors of public universities are appointed without taking into consideration the merit-based factors.
Since the vice chancellors are accountable only to the chancellors, the wishes or opinions of syndicate, the senate and other university institutions are often ignored, the report observed. These rules and practices make the HEIs vulnerable to external political influence. Furthermore, such practices hinder meaningful participation of other members of HEIs in their governance. Changes are in the offing.
The Federal University Ordinance (2002), although not fully implemented, aims to mitigate these pitfalls. Search committees have been approved for universities in Punjab and for the federally chartered universities.
Another important factor is the complex authority structure of the Higher Education Sub-sector (HESS). While provincial universities have a significant degree of autonomy, they are under the financial and administrative oversight of both the Federal and provincial administrations. As to the affiliated colleges, they are under a dual management structure, which includes provincial administration as well as universities with which they are affiliated.
More generally, co-ordination of the HESS is made difficult because of its fragmented nature. Overlaps and blurring of responsibilities amongst oversight bodies hinder policy-making and planning at the sub-sectoral level, and leave entire segments such as affiliated colleges without proper supervision.
The creation of the HEC was based on the need to establish a strong centralised structure with authority over the allocation of funding and quality assurance and to transform HIEs.
This can be partly attributed to the multiple levels of authority over the sub-sector embedded in law, de facto administrative arrangements, tradition, as well as the lack of full implementation of the 2002 Ordinance.
According to report, the private sector already is active in higher education. There is potential for an even larger contribution by private HEIs to broaden access, improve quality, enhance relevance, while alleviating some of the burden on public institutions.
In addition, the public sector and private institutions would mutually benefit from reinforcing their partnership: they would respond better to the growing demand, and would make the entire HESS more responsive to market expectations, the report suggested.