Higher edu institutions to be categorised as ‘accredited’, grading system to go

NEW DELHI: Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) in the country will no longer be given grades under the accreditation system, rather they will be categorised either as “accredited” or “not accredited”, the National Assessment and Accreditation Council (NAAC) decided on Saturday.

In an executive council meeting held on Saturday, the NAAC also decided that the accredited institutions will be further given levels between one and five to encourage them to achieve the highest level.

These sets of reforms will be implemented in two stages -- the binary accreditation (accredited or not accredited) system in the next four months, and Maturity-Based Graded Accreditation (level 1 to 5) by December. “There will be Binary Accreditation (either accredited or not accredited) rather than grades with an aim to encourage all the institutions to get on-boarded in the accreditation process thereby creating a quality culture in the higher education system,” a senior Ministry of Education (MoE) official said.

Moreover, the accreditation authority will use the Maturity-Based Graded Accreditation (Level 1 to 5) to encourage accredited institutions to raise their bar to achieve the highest level of 5 which is “Institutions of Global Excellence for Multi-Disciplinary Research and Education”.