As per the National Education Policy 2020, the Academic Bank of Credits or ABC was developed in order to facilitate the academic mobility of students with the freedom to study across the country’s Higher Education Institutions with an appropriate ‘credit transfer’ mechanism from one programme to another, leading to attain a Degree or PG-Diploma or Diploma.
It is a virtual or digital storehouse that contains the information of the credits that is earned by each student throughout their education journey. The Academic Bank of Credits will enable students to open their accounts and provide multiple options for entering and leaving colleges or universities. There will be ‘multiple exits’ and ‘multiple entries’ points during the higher education tenure and credits will be transferred seamlessly through the Academic Bank of Credits.
It can be considered as an authentic reference to check the credit record of any student at any given point in time. Therefore, the concept of the Academic Bank of Credits is fuel to boost the efficiency of faculty and also help students embrace a multi-disciplinary educational environment. The idea behind developing the Academic Bank of Credits is to make students ‘skillful professionals’ and enhance their growth holistically.
Features
Some of the salient features of the Academic Bank of Credits are mentioned below:
- The Academic Bank of Credits maintains the authenticity and confidentiality of student credits
- It facilitates faster credit recognition
- It permits academic institutions to lodge and maintain the integrity of the credits.
- It helps in the easy transfer of credit through a digital mode
Benefits
Some of the advantages of the Academic Bank of Credits are listed below as:
- It allows multiple entries as well as multiple exits for student
- It stores student credit for a minimum of 7 years
- The Academic Bank of Credits transfers credit through a single-window after approval of source and destination academic institutions
- Only those academic institutions that are verified can upload the credits of students
- It also improves the transparency in the system and helps to build a more flexible approach to curriculum development and design
Process
The credits that are earned by students will be deposited in their Academic Bank of Credits ‘Academic Account’. In case the student transfers to a different institution, the accumulated credits will also get transferred to the account of the new institution. The credits may be transferred from an institution to be accumulated in another programme offered by the same institution or another institution. After the credit is redeemed for the award of the above, it would be irrevocably debited from the respective student’s Academic Account of the Academic Bank of Credits.
Allocation
The process of assigning a number of credits to qualifications, degree programmes or angle educational components. The credits allocated to entire qualifications or programmes according to the respective Universities of Autonomous Institutions participation in the Academic Bank of Credits scheme
Accumulation
A student who has an Academic Account can accumulate credits in order to get qualifications, as required by the degree-awarding institution, or for the documentation of personal achievements for lifelong learning purposes.
Awarding
The act of formally giving students and other learners the credits that are assigned to the qualification or its components in case they achieve the defined learning outcomes. The credits will be awarded to individual students after they have completed the necessary learning activities and have achieved the defined learning outcomes, as concluded by appropriate assessment.