VC KMU said that the creation of QEC Cells was a culmination of a decade's worth of reform in the quality assurance of Pakistan’s higher education. The HEC recommended that the two streams of quality assurance - subject review and institutional audit - should be brought together into a single body for the first time. This provided the blueprint for establishment of QEC’s in the higher education sector.
Quality and standards of the courses taught at the University is the responsibility of all academic staff. Academic staff is expected to have or to develop the skills of effective and excellent teachers. The quality of teaching is assured in part through the Academic Performance Review process. The University provides training and professional development opportunities through QEC’s of the respective Institutions, he added.
Prof. Dr. Mohammad Hafizullah said that the QEC has taken a major step to set and maintain quality and standards for the constituent and affiliated institutions of KMU through this workshop. He said that after establishment and strengthening the QEC’s at various levels we will evaluate whether it is meeting its aims, remains useful, and is flexible and strong enough to accommodate a changing higher education sector.
He said that this work will inform the future development of the Academic Infrastructure and will also contribute to the wider consultation on the future quality assurance system for higher education. QEC is also committed to communicating clearly these future developments to students, parents and teachers whose interest in the quality and standards in higher education QEC exists to safeguard. This workshop is a part of involving senior academics, lecturers and students of all constituent institutions of KMU and is the first event of its kind in KMU and we are very proud to organize such an impressive event.
He further said that this is an opportunity for the higher education sector to get together, and to share and learn from each others' good practice. Above all it's an opportunity to consider how best we can support the development of graduate attributes that will support and help the quality and standards of KMU in the 21st century.
Resource person of the workshop Prof. Dr. Abdul Wahid Usmani Director QEC Dow University of Health Science Karachi also delivered lectures on various topics related to establishing and strengthening of QEC’s at KMU constituents and affiliated institutions/colleges. Later on VC KMU distributed certificates among the participants.
He while criticizing the present curriculum said that the underpracticed curriculum in our medical institutions is only stress on seeking knowledge while that of Problem Based Learning (PBL) is based on life long and self directed learning and it is also less costly. He suggested that a pilot projet may be started for adoptation of PBL on a small scale at any one of the medical college of the province. He stressed that faculty involvement for cahnge in undergraduate curriculum is very essintial and they should be kept on board while introducing new curriculum.
Dr. Sohail Altaf said we must acknowledged the efforts of KMU and especially of its dynamic VC for changing the almost one hundred years old curriculum of undergraduate medical education.He hoped that all the participants will learn a lot from this workshop, but the real beneficiary will be our young medical students and patients of the province as well.
Prof. Hafizullah said that KMU has already conducted a number of workshops both for the faculty of public and private medical colleges, engaging resource persons from Agha Khan, Shifa International and from Rawalpindi Medical College.In the last workshop a number of modules were allotted to various medical colleges for development. They have been prepared and will be discussed in this workshop. These modules will be refined hopefully and will implement in the near future. Prof. Dr. Shad Mohammad Director Academics KMU and Dr. Shiella Pinjani from Aga Khan University Karachi also addressed the workshop
