He said the HEC played a central role in the development of both human beings and modern societies as it enhanced social, cultural and economic development, active citizenship and ethical values.
He said the mandate of the HEC encompassed all degree-granting universities and institutions, public and private, including degree-granting colleges and supported the attainment of quality education in those institutions by facilitating and co-ordinating self-assessment of academic programmes and their external review by national and international experts.
The HEC also supervises the planning, development and accreditation of public and private sector institutions of the higher education. By promoting learning and the advancement of knowledge, the HEC wants to help build a modern, progressive and tolerant society.
The PhD's syllabus review committee's Chairman, Professor Dr Khalid Mehmood Khan, said the HEC intended to play its part in spearheading the building of a knowledge-based economy in Pakistan, adding the key issues were the quality of education imparted to the graduate and its relevance to the economy.
In allocating public funds and developing policies, he said the HEC wanted to encourage institutions to pursue continuous quality improvement and building on their existing strengths in teaching and research, promoting diversity of provision and beneficial collaboration; to help the sector to address the needs of students, employers and society across local, national and international communities; to work towards equal opportunity of access to high quality higher education; and to achieve value for public money by seeking to make the best use of available resources and securing accountability while recognising institutional autonomy.
Commenting on the faculty development, Dr Khalid Mehmood Khan said the faculty members were the key determinants of the quality of education, and regrettably, an area where Pakistani universities were particularly weak.
It was understood here that while the holding of a Ph.D. degree by a faculty member did not guarantee quality, the lack of a Ph.D. did present a high barrier to sustained provision of quality education, he said.
The major thrust of programmes was, therefore, directed towards developing a strong base of Ph.D. level highly qualified faculty members, he added.
He mentioned that the programme had involved scholarship programs for increasing the Ph.D. faculty base, and provision of enhanced facilities to existing Ph.D. qualified faculty to ensure that they had an intellectually stimulating academic career. The scholarship programmes, he said, were being developed for students to attain Ph.D. degrees both within and outside the country.
Dr Khalid said that faculty training recognised that the scholarship programmes had long gestation periods, and, therefore, an emphasis was being placed on the development of faculty training programmes that would enhance the teaching skills, communication skills and subject knowledge of current lecturers at universities.
These programmes of six months to one-year duration were being specifically developed to address key weaknesses of post-graduate education in Pakistan that included weak problem analysis and problem solving skills, weak communication skills, including English language comprehension and expression skills, and lack of exposure to the latest advances in the respective fields of specialisation.
Commenting on the foreign Ph.D. scholarship programme, he said the foreign Ph.D. scholarship programmes had been developed to develop a research base in areas of key importance to the social and economic development of Pakistan, in which the relevant facilities were not available inside the country.
The foreign scholarship programmes were being concentrated in host countries, having advanced standards of education combined with low tuition costs, he added.