NEP 2020 India Frequently Asked Questions (Quiz) with Answers
Higher Education System
Higher education system will also be readjusted, re-vamped and re-energized so that a creative, multidisciplinary and highly skilled workforce can be created.
The quality of university or college education should be such that it must develop good, well-rounded and creative individuals.
Let’s see what all changes will be made in Higher Education System of India under this New Education policy.
• A 3 or 4 year undergraduate programme is on the charts with M.Phil. being discontinued while PhD remains accessible after Master’s degree.
• Flexible curriculum through an interdisciplinary approach creating multiple exit points will be provided. Now let’s c how will this 4 year multidisciplinary programme work? Suppose a student is doing B.tech but he could not complete his B.tech or want to quit after one year due to any reason. Under previous education system that one year of the student would be wasted. But under New Education Policy students can get a certificate after a 1-year programme, an advanced diploma after 2 years, a Bachelor’s degree after 3 years, and a Bachelor’s with research after 4 years. Students can resume the course after a specified period prescribed by the Higher Education Commission. If a student has 3 years of Bachelor’s degree then there may be 2 year of Master’s degree programme with last year devoted entirely to research and if a student has 4 years of Bachelor’s degree with research work, then there could be 1 year of Master’s progamme.
• The 4-year multidisciplinary bachelor’s programme shall be the preferred option since it allows the opportunity to experience the full range of holistic and multidisciplinary education in addition to a focus on the chosen major and minors as per the choices of the student.
• An Academic Credit Bank will be formed which will store the academic credits that students earn by taking courses from various recognized higher education institution. These National Academic Credit Bank may function like a Commercial bank with students as account holders and customers to whom the bank provides a variety of services including credit verification/degree authentication.
• The NEP also proposes to dismantle the UGC and AICTE. There will be a common body known as Higher Education Council of India (HECI) to regulate the higher education institutions. The role of UGC is to coordinate, determine and maintain standards of higher education. It provides recognition to universities in India and provide funds to recognized universities. AICTE monitors engineering and management education in India. It regulates technical higher education in the country. It grants approval for setting up of new technical institutes in India that offer technical education course at Diploma/Degree/PG/Post Diploma/PG Diploma level. The focus of Higher Education Council of India will be on academic matters like evaluating the academic performance of the institutions, training of teachers, setting standards for opening and closure of institutions and to promote educational technology etc. the grant functions would be carried out by the HRD Ministry.
• Affiliation of colleges is to be phased out in 15 years and a stage-wise mechanism to be established for granting graded autonomy to colleges. This system of affiliating colleges exists in only two countries across the world ad India is one of them. Under this system of affiliation colleges work under the universities. Universities decide the curriculum, faculty system, laws and standards. Earlier the number of colleges in our country were less so it was easy to overlook them . But now we have large number of colleges and it becomes difficult to measure the development of individual colleges. So many universities are burdened with a number of affiliated colleges which are continuing to grow in an unmanageable manner. So granting autonomy to colleges will give the power in the hands of institute itself to make decisions governing various aspects of the colleges and this autonomy will be given to them based on their accreditation system like A+, A or B+ . Based on their accreditation status they will be given academic, administrative and financial autonomy. By 2025 all colleges currently affiliated to a university shall secure accreditation and become autonomous degree granting colleges.
• Gross enrollment ration in higher education will be increased to 50% by 2035. Growth enrolment ratio means number of students enrolled in a given level of education. The current Gross enrolment ration in Higher Education is 26.3 % which will be increased to 50% by 2035.
