PESHAWAR: The Higher Education Department of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province has planned to introduce the four-year Bachelor of Studies (BS) programme in all government colleges and universities of the province by doing away with the existing two-year degree programme.
However, the plan will be executed in phases only after it is okayed by the Higher Education Commission.
Currently, the two degree programmes run parallel in the province with most government educational institutions offering the conventional BA / BSc course.
The BS programme was introduced by the last Awami National Party-led government around three years ago.
The four-year BS degree is equivalent to MA/MSc degree.
Special Assistant to the Chief Minister on Higher Education Mushtaq Ahmad said that the provincial HED wanted to phase out the conventional degree system by replacing it with the BS programme.
“It is our desire to get rid of the decades-old conventional higher education system,” he said.
Mushtaq also said the HED had proposed to the HEC to redesign the four-year BS programme to introduce the two-year associate degree programme in the province.
He said once the proposed programme was in place, then the students wanting to discontinue studies for one reason or the other could secure the associate degree after successfully completing two years of the BS course.
The special assistant said the students opting for the associate degree could resume the BS programme anytime afterwards.
Currently, the students enrolled in the BS programme have to study for four years to get degrees and in case, they leave the course in the middle, they’re not entitled to the degrees.
INTERNEWS
