IITS to help monitor higher edu institutes

The Indian Institutes of Technology (IITS) have, after years of prodding, agreed to help the government monitor and accredit programmes and courses run by thousands of colleges and universities in the country.

All the older IITS will join in the effort, with those in Delhi and in Guwahati already having written to the union human resource development (HRD) ministry expressing their willingness and have professors assigned for the purpose.

“We will cooperate with the government,” IIT Delhi director V. Ramgopal Rao said. India has 903 universities and around 49,000 colleges and institutions but not even 25% of them or their courses have been accredited by central agencies such as the National Board of Accreditation.

For last two years, the HRD ministry has been talking to IITS and IIMS about how they can play a role in the accreditation process. Accreditation is important as it puts in place a certain level of standards to be followed by colleges and universities in terms of their academic and administrative functions.

A better accreditation system will also help countries that are part of the Washington Accord in recognising each others’ degrees. Now, a select group of IIT professors will spend their weekends visiting institutions and vetting the quality of courses they are offering, according to the plan that has been put in place.

They may also give them a road map on how to improve industry connect and align courses with the present requirements of employers.

“Monitoring and accreditation are good and several of the top institutions have already got their programmes accredited.

However, the authorities should also put in place a system where the top institutions in the private sector are given more autonomy,” said Harivansh Chaturvedi, director of BIMTECH, a business school in Greater Noida.