By S P Thyagarajan. India has witnessed a massive expansion of universities and colleges since 1950-51. While universities grew from 25 to 614, colleges grew from 700 to 33,023 with student enrolment increasing from one lakh to 169.75 lakh and teachers from 15,000 to 8.17 lakh, resulting in the gross enrolment ratio (GER) of 13.58 per cent as of 2012. With the 2011-12 student enrolment of 1,79,96,752, the GER is projected to swell to 30 per cent by 2020.
Despite rapid reforms in higher education, matching reforms in funding pattern, accountability, quality and excellence could not be achieved because of capacity constraints in government higher education institutions (HEIs). This resulted in private HEIs (60-80 per cent) gaining prominence; substandard infrastructure and inadequate faculty (average deficit of 51.36 per cent in universities and 41per cent in colleges, UGC 2009); and loss of ethics and values in administration of both government and private HEIs. Read more...

By Judith S. Eaton. The most recent conversation about “credit hour,” a description of time on task required of students in their courses, programs and degrees, is about how this concept might be tied to student learning outcomes. It is also about the federal financing of higher education and sustaining the role that the credit hour has played in this funding. Discussion of student learning outcomes – setting expectations of student learning and judging whether expectations are achieved – has, to date, been led by the academy. Discussion of federal funding and the credit hour has been led by government officials and focuses on what will be financed and how.
Care and caution are essential as we proceed with both the student learning discussion and the federal financing discussion. Why? While the academy is not trying to do the government’s work of figuring out federal financing of the credit hour, the government has displayed considerable interest in doing the academy’s work – determining and judging student learning. This emerging development is undesirable, not only for the academy and government, but also for students and the public.
The Student Learning Outcomes Discussion
The discussion about appropriate outcomes of learning, how to achieve them and how to provide evidence for them, has been underway in the academy for years and is well advanced. It includes credit hour considerations, but is much broader. Lately, the discussion has been driven by the emphasis on accountability and public demands for evidence of student achievement from colleges and universities. It is also related to the impact that online learning, competency-based learning and assessment of prior learning have had on the traditional collegiate classroom-based experience which, for most of its history, has defined higher education and thus defined the credit hour.
An outcomes-based approach to the credit hour can be flexible. It can be implemented within traditional time parameters leading to a degree, such as semesters or quarters. Or, it can be done independently of time: Once a student has provided evidence of learning, progress or completion can be formally noted through a credential of some sort. This last helps to explain not only the recent renewed emphasis on competency-based education and assessment of prior learning, but also the emerging interest in educational practices such as private companies offering online coursework at very low prices (StraighterLine) and massive open online courses (Coursera, Udacity).
The Federal Funding Discussion
The time-based credit hour has been used by the federal government to determine how much and for what period of time federal aid such as the Pell Grant, the largest aid program, is available to students. The federal government is spending historically large sums of money on Pell and other programs, some $175 billion each year. The assumption has been that financing adequate time expended to earn credits is a good use of federal funds and financing too little time expended is a misuse of federal dollars.
While the credit hour concept is well embedded in federal law and regulation, government officials are now persuaded that there is insufficient return on investment using the time-based credit hour. The value proposition put forward is that learning outcomes may be a more effective indicator of whether federal money is spent appropriately.
Care and Caution
In 2011, the U.S. Department of Education issued a regulation that provided a federal definition of “credit hour,” accompanied by requiring nongovernmental accrediting organizations to enforce and monitor its use. The federal definition is complex and a work in progress, but allows for either a time-based or outcomes-based approach to the credit hour. Given that definition of credit hour has been the province of the academy for more than 100 years, why, for the first time, is the government defining this concept, superseding the work of the academy?
In 2012, the National Advisory Committee on Institutional Quality and Integrity, advising the Secretary of Education on the recognition of accrediting organizations, released a report examining the effectiveness of accreditation. The report does not focus on the credit hour, but does address student learning outcomes. While not going so far as calling for common outcome measures, the main report does recommend establishing common definitions of outcomes across institutions. The alternative report accompanying the main document calls for institutions to provide common information on some student outcomes. Although both recommendations do not establish and standardize student outcomes, it is a short step from common definitions and common information to national standardization.
Both of these efforts are indications that the government discussion of financing the credit hour is expanding to become a discussion of determining and judging student learning outcomes as well. In some instances, the government taking on this role is assumed. Amy Laitinen’s September 2012 report, Cracking the Credit Hour, offers valuable suggestions about further experimentation with outcomes-based approaches to the credit hour. However, although the report does not directly address financing of the credit hour (the province of government), it does recommend that the federal government provide the leadership for this experimentation (the province of the academy).
We need government officials who understand the importance of turning to the academy for guidance about any transition of the credit hour from time-based to outcomes-based, whether whole or partial. Only after these learning outcome determinations have been made by the academic community is government in a position to decide whether and how funds will be provided. Federal regulations that place authority for student learning outcomes in the hands of government officials and not academics are undesirable and, frankly, likely to be less than effective.
If the government now defines the credit hour, decides the data that are to be used for student learning outcomes and leads experiments in alternative approaches for using an outcomes-based approach to the credit hour, what is left for the academy to do?

The European Consortium for Accreditation in higher education (ECA) decided to develop a European certificate for the assessment of internationalisation. The first meeting of the CeQuInt project Steering Group took place in NVAO premises in the Hague on 13 November 2012.
Today internationalisation itself is perceived as an indicator for the quality of higher education, but so far only few European-wide approaches have assessed the quality of internationalisation. The current national accreditation systems do not explicitly include international and intercultural learning outcomes and a commonly agreed assessment methodology is lacking. Therefore, the European Consortium for Accreditation in higher education (ECA) decided to develop a European certificate for the assessment of internationalisation. In October 2012, a consortium of quality assurance agencies from eleven countries, the Academic Cooperation Association (ACA), and the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) started the development of a Certificate for the Quality of Internationalisation (CeQuInt). This ECA project is funded by the EU and coordinated by the Accreditation Organisation of The Netherlands and Flanders (NVAO). The overall aim of the project is to assess, reward and enhance internationalisation.
A positive assessment by an assessment panel will lead to the award by ECA of the Certificate for Quality in Internationalisation. This certificate confirms that a programme or institution has successfully included a significant international and/or intercultural dimension in the purpose, function and delivery of its education. The Certificate for Quality in Internationalisation is intended to lead to a substantial improvement in the transparency and level of internationalisation.
The first meeting of the CeQuInt project Steering Group took place in NVAO premises in the Hague on 13 November 2012. The project partners have given specific attention to the further definition of assessment methodology, the identification of candidates for the pilot procedures, the specific roles and profiles of experts in the assessment panels and the commencement of dissemination activities. The immediate agreed actions include a stronger involvement of experts from the professional field in the assessment panels, the introduction of a core group of experts that will take part in several pilot procedures and the reporting of national and international dissemination activities. The next Steering Group meeting is foreseen to take place in Slovenia in March 2013.
For more information please visit the CeQuInt project website.

The Council for Higher Education Accreditation (CHEA) has issued the CHEA Initiative Final Report, drawn from the CHEA Initiative’s four-year national conversation on the future of accreditation.
“The CHEA Initiative was launched in 2008, commencing an unprecedented national discussion of the challenges and opportunities facing higher education accreditation,” said CHEA President Judith Eaton.
The Initiative focused on building support for two major goals: (1) to sustain a balance and distinction between accountability to the federal government and the academic work of accreditation and (2) to further enhance accountability in accreditation. “In addition to affirming the importance of some modification of the accreditation-federal government relationship, the Initiative resulted in clear affirmation of the need for institutions and accrediting organizations to work together to further shape and provide additional leadership for public accountability,” Eaton said.
During the four years of the Initiative, some 2,500 representatives from colleges and universities, recognized accrediting organizations and other participants in higher education accreditation took part in National Accreditation Fora, CEO/CAO roundtables, meetings with accrediting commissions and other activities designed to stimulate discussion and generate ideas.
“The many voices in the accreditation discussion have yielded valuable insights and understandings, for the community and for CHEA,” Eaton concluded.
International Quality Assurance
5. As approved by the board of directors, CHEA has established a CHEA International Quality Group (CIQG). Its purpose is to provide service related to international higher education quality to member institutions, accreditation/quality assurance organizations, higher education associations, students, government and employers. These services are intended to advance understanding of international quality assurance, assist institutions and accreditation/quality assurance organizations in their expanding international engagement and further enhance capacity for academic quality in international higher education. In response to what was learned during the CHEA Initiative dialogue, CIQG will focus on capacity-building for U.S. accrediting organizations in particular, aiding accreditors as they make decisions whether or not to operate internationally, where and how.

The Council for Higher Education Accreditation (CHEA) and the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) have released an advisory statement on Accreditation and Academic Freedom.
“This advisory statement addresses the role that accreditation plays in sustaining and enhancing academic freedom in the context of review of institutions and programs for quality,” said CHEA President Judith Eaton. “It is a response to concerns that academic freedom is increasingly challenged in today’s environment and that accreditation can play an even more helpful role in meeting this challenge.”
AAUP Senior Program Officer Anita Levy noted “This effort emerged from a desire to reaffirm the importance of academic freedom and its central role in the success of colleges and universities and the work of faculty. The advisory statement is designed to stimulate discussion of academic freedom among institutions, faculty and accrediting organizations.”
In early 2012, CHEA and AAUP agreed to work together to address the issue of academic freedom and the role of accreditation. CHEA and AAUP brought together a group of accrediting organizations, members of the AAUP Committee on Accreditation and others to develop an advisory statement.
The advisory statement has been approved both by the CHEA Board of Directors and the AAUP Committee on Accreditation. The statement provides guidance to CHEA institutional members, recognized accrediting organizations and AAUP members.
A national advocate and institutional voice for self-regulation of academic quality through accreditation, CHEA is an association of approximately 3,000 degree-granting colleges and universities and recognizes 60 institutional and programmatic accrediting organizations. CHEA is the only national association focused exclusively on higher education accreditation.
The American Association of University Professors is a nonprofit charitable and educational organization that promotes academic freedom and shared governance, and defines fundamental professional values and standards for higher education. The AAUP has approximately 48,000 members at colleges and universities throughout the United States. For further information, see AAUP’s 1940 Statement on Academic Freedom and Tenure and The Role of Faculty in the Accrediting of Colleges and Universities, and CHEA publications The Condition of Accreditation: U.S. Accreditation in 2011 and The Value of Accreditation.

The Multilateral Agreement on the Mutual Recognition of Accreditation Results regarding Joint Programmes (MULTRA) is now signed by 8 agencies.
On 14 December 2010 ECA members launched the Multilateral Agreement on the Mutual Recognition of Accreditation Results regarding Joint Programmes (MULTRA).
On 13 June 2012 two new agencies - EVA Denmark and AQU Catalunya have signed the MULTRA.
The purpose of the MULTRA is to simplify the accreditation and recognition of joint programmes and degrees awarded and to provide an efficient way to expand mutual recognition to more European Higher Education Area countries.
The MULTRA is now signed by the agencies FHR and ÖAR (Austria), EVA (Denmark), CTI (France), NVAO (The Netherlands and Flanders), PKA (Poland), ANECA (Spain), and AQU Catalunya (Spain).
For more information on the MULTRA click here.

By Kelly Heyboer and Ted Sherman/The Star-Ledger. With great fanfare, Kean University and Chinese officials broke ground last March on the first foreign campus of the New Jersey institution, to be built at Wenzhou University in Zhejiang Province.
Amid ceremonial drummers, colorful dragon dancers and yards of bright red bunting, school officials turned over shovels of dirt to mark the start of construction of a massive new campus that will ultimately enroll 5,000 full-time Chinese students who will earn degrees from Kean. The university, however, never sought accreditation for the high-profile Far East venture from the Middle States Commission on Higher Education — which has already placed Kean on probation for failure to meet academic standards.
Now the accrediting agency wants to know why. Kean is already on shaky ground with Middle States, a powerful independent agency with the ability to strip a school of its vital accreditation if a campus runs afoul of its rules. New questions about one of its projects does not help matters.
"The university has been told on several occasions that they must go through the substantive change process," said Richard Pokrass, a spokesman for the commission. "They have not done that. They have not submitted anything in writing."
Without Middle States’ approval, it is likely the deal to build the China campus would fall apart. An accredited program was one of Kean’s key selling points when it made the deal with the Chinese government to build the campus. But Kean officials insist they are in full compliance with Middle States’ rules and are moving ahead with plans to offer classes in Wenzhou this fall to their first 200 Chinese students. Kean, a four-year public university in Union Township with 16,000 students, has spent the last year dealing with internal turmoil amid the growing concerns of Middle States — which has cited the school for violating numerous academic and ethical rules.
Last year, the commission warned Kean that its academic standing was in jeopardy for failing to meet accreditation standards in several key areas during a periodic review. Then, the faculty union — which has a long history of discord with the president — discovered what it said were serious misrepresentations in president Dawood Farahi’s résumé. He later admitted there were mistakes, but claimed they were the fault of unidentified Kean staff members. While the Kean board of trustees narrowly backed the president by a 7-4 vote with one abstention, one trustee resigned in the wake of the vote to keep him in office.
Last month, Middle States’ board voted to put Kean on formal probation after its reviewers returned to campus and found additional problems.
The prospect of losing accreditation has serious consequences for both a university and its students. Students at schools stripped of their accreditation may not be able to get financial aid, transfer their credits to other colleges or use their degrees to attend graduate school.
The focus by Middle States on the China program came in a letter to the university sent last month, requesting additional information about the new campus.
Putting Kean in China has been a long-time goal of Farahi. As far back as 2006, Kean officials were working on an agreement to establish a branch campus in Wenzhou (pronounced Wun-jo or Wen-chou), a port city on the East China Sea south of Shanghai.
After a series of setbacks, work finally began on the campus this year in a well-publicized ground breaking, with plans to enroll as many as 5,000 full-time students by fall 2016. Kean has already hired several faculty members to work in China and a pilot program with 200 Chinese students is set to begin this fall, school officials said.
"Our Wenzhou partners remain fully confident that Kean will meet all the standards for Middle States accreditation and will succeed in obtaining Middle States approval for the establishment of our branch campus in Wenzhou," said Matt Caruso, a Kean spokesman. But in their most recent letter to Kean, Middle States officials noted the university has already appointed a new board of directors for the Wenzhou-Kean University campus and has begun construction. Pokrass, the Middle States’ spokesman, said the university has not requested approval for the project, as is required for any "substantive change" to an accredited school.
"Given what’s going on, they need to get this material to the commission as soon as possible," said Pokrass.
Kean officials argue, under their interpretation of Middle State’s rules, they are in compliance. Caruso said the university does not need to apply for approval of the China campus until the program is more established and students are earning more than 50 percent of their credits toward a degree in Wenzhou.
"We are offering less than the threshold for the moment," Caruso said.
Members of the Kean Federation of Teachers, the university’s faculty union, said they have repeatedly raised concerns about the lack of transparency surrounding the China campus. Last week, the Kean Faculty Senate voted 19-4 to release a statement of "no confidence" in Farahi.
Caruso said Farahi is "disappointed" by the senate’s no-confidence vote, adding, "But his entire focus right now is on preparing and finalizing the university’s monitoring report for Middle States."