ISLAMABAD, July 25: The steering committee of the provincial education secretaries has decided to execute the plan of a four-year degree programme in a phased manner in degree colleges of all the provinces.

The decision was taken at the 8th meeting of the steering committee. “The transition will be brought about in a phased manner initially through degree colleges to be identified and developed by the provincial governments,” said Prof (Dr) Sohail Naqvi, Executive Director Higher Education Commission (HEC), while presiding over the meeting.

The committee, which was constituted in 2003 to ensure cooperation between the HEC and the provincial education departments, is responsible for deliberating upon issues of mutual interest and evolving better strategies for their resolution.

Dr Naqvi informed the members that the four-year programme had already been running successfully for all the professional degree courses like agricultural sciences, animal husbandry, architecture and town planning as well as city and regional planning, engineering and medical and pharmaceutical sciences.

He said following the HEC initiative, almost all the universities have switched over to the new scheme of study for their BS degrees in computer sciences and IT, basic and natural sciences, management sciences and social sciences. “The model system for adoption of the four-year programme through selected degree colleges, to be finalised by government of the Punjab, will be provided to other provinces”, he said.

The committee appreciated the idea of monitoring the collaborative degrees between local and foreign institutions and desired that inspection of such institutions be made after regular intervals to keep vigilance over standards of education. The concept of collaborative degrees is aimed at providing local students a foreign degree at relatively cheaper rates without actually going abroad.

The local partner institutions are required to follow curricula, scheme of studies, assessment and evaluation processes of the foreign university.

The committee was informed about the progress made regarding the fulfilment of the cabinet criteria for private degree awarding institutions. The members appreciated the commission’s efforts and agreed on pressing sponsors of private institutions to satisfy the parameters of the cabinet criteria.

The meeting was attended by Jan Mohammad Dashti, secretary education Balochistan; Maqsood Mumtaz, additional secretary, education Punjab; Hazrat Masud Mian, additional secretary NWFP education department; Taj Mohamamd Seelro, additional secretary (academics and training), Sindh; Mohammad Javed Khan, director general attestation and accreditation HEC; Anwar Amjad, consultant IT, HEC; Ms. Ghayyur Fatima, deputy director curriculum, HEC, and Hassan Zaidi, project coordinator, digital library programme, HEC.