Academic Credit Bank UGC Initiative

Academic Credit Bank UGC Initiative. UGC has brought the Academic Bank of Credits, the Academic Bank of Credits has been established on the lines of the National Academic Depository (NAD), in the sense, NAD is the backbone of ABC, where the students’ academic data are held and academic awards are stored (i.e. storehouse of academic awards). Despite the fact that ABC enables students to register or commence credit transfer, the final outcomes of credit redemption and issuance of certificates, as well as the compilation of award records, are administered by academic institutions via the NAD Platform. Hence being the owner of academic awards, Academic Institutions must mandatorily register themselves under ABC via NAD.

NAC Bank is a via media to choose one’s academic path to attain a degree/diploma/post diploma. It works on the principles of multi-entry and multi-exit (ME ME) as well as any-time learning, anywhere learning and any-level learning.

It also provides lots of options for course correction if so required during the period of study.

“Credits awarded to a student for one program from an institution may be transferred/redeemed by another institution upon students consent” Credit transfer is the key to successful study mobility

It is not mandatory for the students to open or choose the path of use of NAC Bank.

The duration of the course can be shortened by a maximum of 25 per cent to allow students to take full advantage of the scheme.

In the beginning, the MBA, MCA and MSc (Science and Catering) were included as these courses are much in demand and do not require laboratory work.

The validity of credit would be for 8 years, after 8 years it will be meaningless or nullified for official purposes.

National Academic Credit Bank would be a digital/Virtual/online entity which is managed by MHRD/UGC. UGC NAC works like a commercial bank with students, they are the account holders. NAC Bank will be linked to National Academic Repository (NAD). NAC bank may provide deposit accounts to all the students who are studying in any recognized Higher Education Institutes (HEI).

The academic credit earned by a student in the system can be automatically credited to his or her account and after accumulation of credit to certain levels a student can accrue and redeem the credit for any academic programme at any convenient time. The academic programme is an educational programme leading to the award of a degree, diploma or certificate.

The National Academic Credit Bank will serve as a storehouse of students’ data and their credit earned. This will facilitate the students who want to consolidate their academic records for employment or educational purpose.

To Understand NAC Bank’s feature more clearly following are the cases

Case-1 If a student wanted to study physics as a major, but with peer and parental pressures he is forced to join engineering. Though he was a performer but was not happy with his stream. Fortunately, in his 5th semester, he got an opportunity from a top university in the US under students abroad programme. The opportunity comes as a boon to working under a very distinguished professor who was himself a student under a Nobel laureate.

The students on his mentor’s advice he ended up taking up some unique courses a) 20TH Century Science b) quantum computing and c). World of music etc., these were in addition to the project he undertook. The student is back in India now with huge excitement and more clarity about his further studies and future. This has been possible due to academic flexibility and credit transfer facilities.

Case 2 Another student entered into an engineering course similar to the above case but with interest. But in his second semester, he lost interest in engineering as a career and decided to migrate to a BBA course. But there was no option earlier and as a result, he lost a full year. The conventional method did not help him provide him credit transfer.

A scheme like NAC Bank could have easily benefitted such a student to typically transfer half of his credits to the new degree programme in the form of credits for language courses, environmental courses, introductory courses for IT/Computer or some other course that could have converted in the form of open electives. In such a case, loss of time could have been minimized and transformation could have been smoothened for a needy student with the help of NAC Bank.

There are many such situations where the academic status is forced to change due to personal reasons like marriage, family moving to a new city, the necessity to take up a job for family needs and other situations.

Under all such circumstances, the concept of NAC Bank comes in handy to maintain the continuity of studies even if there is a disruption.

Credit award system
Credit will be awarded to those students who have completed a module or a unit of the qualification. To attain this, they need to meet the specific set of learning for a module/Unit or qualification.

Learning outcomes would outline what a successful student will know, understand and be able to do. It is an achievement of learning that is more important for the award of credit.

To be awarded the credit the student must meet the minimum standard, or one can say a threshold or pass in the assessment. The minimum standard has been set out in HEIs assessment regulation.

Exceeding the minimum standard of standard does not result in a student being awarded more credit as the credit value is fixed.

Academic credit is freely transferable within a given system because of the NAC Bank. As the student progress through a programme of study, they can accumulate a value of modules or units they have completed successfully. Even institutions can also make arrangements that can allow students to transfer the credit they have been awarded.

Students may be able to do so as part of a study programme to another, offered by the same institution and/or transfer credit when moving from one institution to another. The way students can transfer credit would be determined by the institution’s assessment regulation.