The Curricular Aspects are the mainstay of any educational Institution. However, the responsibilities of various HEIs in this regard vary depending on their administrative standing. That is, an Affiliated College is essentially a teaching unit which depends on a larger body namely affiliating university for legitimizing its academic and administrative processes. Its engagement with curricular aspects is mainly in their implementation while its participation in curriculum development, procedural detailing, assessment procedures as well as certification is peripheral and these are “givens‟‟. Whereas a University has the mandate to visualize appropriate curricula for particular programmes, it has to revise/update them periodically to ensure that the outcomes of its programmes are defined by its bodies. Criterion I pertains to the practices of an Institution in initiating a wide range of programme options and courses that are in tune with the emerging national and global trends and relevant to the local needs. Apart from issues of diversity and academic flexibility, aspects on career orientation, multi-skill development, feedback system and involvement of stakeholders in curriculum updating are also gauged.
KEY INDICATORS
1.1*(U) -Curriculum Design and Development
1.1*(A) – Curriculum Planning and Implementation
1.2 Academic Flexibility
1.3 Curriculum Enrichment
1.4 Feedback System
1.1 Curricular Planning and Implementation
The Affiliating/Constituent Colleges have rather limited role in curriculum designing and development. They adopt the curriculum overview provided by the respective Affiliating Universities. Each college operationalizes the curriculum within the overall framework provided, in one‟s own way depending on its resource potential, Institutional goals and concern and so on. That is, each college visualizes the way the curriculum has to be carried out – activities, who, how, when etc. This process makes each Institution unique and reflects on the concern of the college for quality in the form of values emphasized, sensitivities focused on, etc.
1.2 Academic Flexibility
Academic flexibility refers to the freedom in the use of the time-frame of the courses, horizontal mobility, inter-disciplinary options and others facilitated by curricular transactions. Supplementary enrichment programmes introduced as an initiative of the college, credit system and choice offered in the curriculum, in terms of programme, curricular transactions and time-frame options are also considered in this key indicator.
1.3 Curriculum Enrichment
Holistic development of students is the main purpose of curriculum. While this ism attempted through prescribing dynamic and updated curricular inputs, the HEI is expected to have provision for added courses and activities which may not be directly linked with one‟s discipline of study but contribute to sensitizing students to cross-cutting issues relevant to the current pressing concerns both nationally and internationally such as gender, environment and sustainability, human values and professional ethics, development of creative and divergent competencies.
1.4 Feedback System
The process of revision and redesign of curricula is based on recent developments and feedback from the stakeholders. The feedback from all stakeholders in terms of its relevance and appropriateness in catering to the needs of the society, economy and environment helps in improving the inputs.A HEI with the feedback system in place will have an active process of not only collecting feedback from all stakeholders, but also analyzing it and identifying and drawing pertinent pointers to enhance the learning effectiveness.
