Even as the University Grants Commission (UGC) has made accreditation mandatory for higher education institutions in the country, the Department of Collegiate Education has introduced its own evaluation model for its 350 government degree colleges.
The Continuous Evaluation for Quality and Excellence (CEQE), which has been launched as a pilot project in 60 colleges (10 colleges each across six regions), will, in all likelihood, be introduced for the remaining colleges in the academic year 2013-14.
Revealing this on the sidelines of a two-day national conference on “Benchmarking” at the Maharani Lakshmi Ammanni College for Women here on Friday, B.L. Bhagyalakshmi, Director, Department of Collegiate Education, told reporters that the aim of the project was to “prepare government colleges for accreditation by the National Assessment and Accreditation Council (NAAC).”
“During the first phase of accreditation in 2003, 110 of the (then) existing 165 colleges were accredited. In 2006-2007, the State government established 191 colleges at one go. These colleges have completed five years of existence, making them eligible for accreditation from NAAC,” she said.
She added that her department had identified 44 colleges which will be prepared for NAAC accreditation, for which they had been allotted Rs. 1.2 lakh each.
“In March, eight (government) colleges earned accreditation — three re-accreditations and five fresh ones. We are giving funds for construction of laboratories and additional rooms to 80 colleges and funds to construct toilets in 200 colleges,” she added.
“We have finished grading 10 colleges in Bangalore and Mangalore. For the pilot project, we selected a variety of colleges. But we have asked all colleges to adopt CEQE from the coming academic year,” she said.
Earlier, delivering the keynote address, Ms. Bhagyalakshmi emphasised the need to shift focus on quality rather than “mere accessibility”.
