BENGALURU: The National Accreditation and Assessment Council (NAAC) on Friday decided to reform its process of grading colleges and universities. The organisation will now give “Binary Accreditation” to institutions, which means they are either accredited or not accredited, rather than grades. This is being done to encourage all the institutions to get on board in the accreditation process, thereby creating a quality culture in the higher education system, said NAAC in a statement.The other major reform set to take place is maturity-based graded accreditation (Levels 1 to 5). From Level 1 to Level 4, institutions will be marked as National Excellence, and for Level 5, institutions will be given the tag of Global Excellence for Multi-Disciplinary Research and Education based on different parameters. “The levelled accreditation shall enable Indian institutions to significantly improve their quality and position themselves among the top global institutions,” said the NAAC Executive Committee.The metrics for both binary and maturity-based graded accreditation will focus on processes, outcomes, and impact across different attributes of Higher Education Institutions (HEIs). The new process will also consider the heterogeneity of HEIs and categorise them based on their vision and legacy. Based on these, the institutions will be allocated categories rather than a one-size-fits-all model, according to the release.One Nation, One Data Platform will also be implemented to ensure integrity and transparency in handling institutional data. The system will improve the validity and reliability of the data through stakeholder validation for the ranking process. Though the technology-driven modern system will require minimal visits to institutions for verification, heavy penalties will be charged for wrong submissions.The final report, incorporating feedback received from stakeholders, was accepted by the Ministry of Education on January 16, 2024. NAAC will implement the ‘Transformative Refroms for Strengthening Periodic Assessment and Accreditation of All HEIs in India’ report in two stages.In the first stage, the binary accreditation will be implemented in the next four months, and no new applications will be accepted as per the present methodology. “Institutions that have already applied and are applying in the next four months shall have the option to either go by the present process or by the new methodology of binary accreditation. The maturity-based graded levels will be implemented by December 2024,” said the release.The reforms are in line with suggestions made by the overarching committee helmed by K Radhakrishnan, former Chairman of ISRO and Chairperson, Standing Committee of the IIT Council, constituted in November 2022.
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