Telangana to roll out grading system for private professional colleges; fee reimbursement to be linked

The Telangana government plans to introduce a grading system for private professional colleges, categorizing them from A+ to D. Tuition fees and fee reimbursement will be linked to the grades. A 10-member committee will frame guidelines for implementation.

Hyderabad: Private professional colleges in the State will soon be graded under a new system, which is set to be rolled out to standardise quality and bring accountability to higher education.

Under the proposed system, the colleges are likely to be categorised into five – A+, A, B, C and D – grades based on academic and infrastructure criteria.

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The grading system will be applicable to private professional colleges offering engineering, pharmacy, MBA, MCA, BEd, MEd, MTech, MPharmacy, BArch and MArch programmes.

According to sources, the grading will be based on several parameters, including National Assessment and Accreditation Council grade, National Institutional Ranking Framework ranking, infrastructure, placements and faculty.

Sources say that based on the grading, the college’s tuition fee will be determined accordingly. In addition, the government plans to link the grading system to the fee reimbursement disbursal. The government intends to prioritise and disburse fee reimbursement to colleges that are categorised under A+, A and B.

The State government already owes nearly Rs.8,000 crore fee reimbursement arrears to the private colleges, including professional colleges. The colleges have recently joined hands and threatened an indefinite strike if the government fails to clear fee arrears. However, instead of clearing the tuition fee arrears, the government plans to grade colleges and link it to fee reimbursement.

To frame modalities for fee fixation in private professional colleges and their grading, the government will shortly constitute a 10-member committee, which is likely to be headed by Telangana Council of Higher Education Chairman Prof. V Balakista Reddy.

The committee is likely to have Technical and Collegiate Education Commissioner A Sridevasena, TGCHE Secretary Prof. Sriram Venkatesh, JNTU-Hyderabad Registrar K Venkateswara Rao, and officials drawn from Directorate of Town and Country Planning, Social Welfare department and a senior OU engineering department professor and other government officials besides subject experts as members.

According to sources, the committee will study the fee fixation methods followed in other States and develop a set of guidelines for tuition fee fixation in the State.

The order copy on the committee constitution has been referred to the Law department for vetting, sources added.