Foreword

The National Plan for Higher Education ‘provides the strategic framework for re-engineering the higher education system in the twenty-first century’ (Minister of Education, 2001).   

The New Academic Policy proposed in this Discussion Document aims to provide the academic planning framework to underpin this project. It also represents a further pillar in the process of constructing a higher education system which fulfils the goals of the Education White Paper 3: A Programme for the Transformation of Higher Education, 1997. 

The Council on Higher Education (CHE) was requested by the Department of Education (DoE) in late 1999 to take on the task of developing a new academic policy in consultation with key higher education stakeholders. To give effect to this project, the CHE established an Academic Policy Task Team comprising of members of the CHE and representatives of key national stakeholders, including the Department of Education (DoE) and the South African Qualifications Authority (SAQA). Two years of work and debate around what are often highly complex issues has brought the CHE to the point where it is happy to hand over its report to the DoE for publication as a Discussion Document. 

The policies and guidelines proposed herein are by no means complete or final. The CHE itself has not examined the report of the Academic Policy Task Team for the purpose of advising the Minister of Education, a stage that will only come after the close of the public comment period. As a result CHE members are not bound by the proposals and regulations advanced in the report. Instead, the CHE’s discussion of the report has been solely to ascertain whether it is ready to be handed over to the DoE for release as a Discussion Document. In this regard, the CHE believes that sufficient work has been done for a meaningful, structured, critical and vigorous debate on these proposals to now occur. With the benefit of inputs from all those concerned with higher education it should be possible to move forward to a point where policies and regulations can be adopted with a high degree of consensus. 

The New Academic Policy document has been developed with due recognition of the authority of SAQA for policies and regulations related to the National Qualifications Framework (NQF) and the registration of qualifications. There has also been a concerted attempt to ensure that there is a high level of congruency between the New Academic Policy document and the Development of Level Descriptors for the National Qualifications Framework document of SAQA - for example around level structures and the consequent qualification pegging arrangements. 

Indeed, the CHE and SAQA documents will be released simultaneously and it is crucially important that they are read together. Both documents will provide for public comments until 28 February 2002. In the case of this New Academic Policy Discussion Document, as indicated in the Preface public comments must be forwarded to the DoE, Higher Education Branch. The DoE will give due consideration to all comments received and thereafter prepare an Academic Policy document for consultation and eventual adoption. 

There are a number of key issues that the CHE believes require further discussion and debate. These are: 

1. The number of levels allocated to higher education on the National Qualifications Framework and the related pegging of qualifications 
   The South African Qualification Authority (SAQA) originally allocated 4 out of 8 levels on the National Qualifications Framework (NQF) to higher education. However, the CHE Academic Policy Task Team was concerned that these could not adequately accommodate the full range of higher education offerings. Research on international comparisons reported on in Chapter 3 indicates that most other higher education qualifications frameworks consist of at least 6 levels. After lengthy consultation, SAQA has agreed to the CHE’s Academic Policy Task Team’s proposal that, given the four levels for higher education, sub-levels be used to accommodate the range of HE qualifications. SAQA has agreed to this and proposed that levels 5 to 7 be used for undergraduate qualifications and that the open-ended level 8 be split into 4 postgraduate levels. [The Advanced Bachelor’s Degree is an anomaly in this arrangement, for although an undergraduate degree, it will sit at Level 8, Postgraduate sub-level 1].   
   However, there may well be other ways of addressing this problem that should be explored, such as increasing the number of levels on the NQF for higher education. Thus, for example, the Masters could be pegged at level 9 or 10 and the Doctorate a level 10 or 11. Alternatively, some stakeholders may believe that too many sub-levels have been created and that three postgraduate levels or sub-levels would suffice.
2. The ‘nested approach’ to standard-setting for higher education qualifications on the NQF   
   If this approach, proposed in Chapter 4 of the report, were to be adopted, the process of standard-setting would move from the generic to the specific. Standards would be set by policy for level descriptors and qualification descriptors. Sectoral Standards Generating Bodies (SGBs) established under the auspices of South African Universities Vice-Chancellors’ Association (SAUVCA) and the Committee of Technikons Principals (CTP) would generate the generic variants of the qualification types, e.g. the BA, BSc, BCom and BSocSci for the General Bachelor’s Degree and the BTech, BEng, LLB for the Career-focused Bachelor’s Degree. This process could be completed for SAQA’s full registration of qualifications in mid-2003. If this model were to be followed, then it would not be necessary for individual providers of qualification specialisations, which will sit under these more generic qualification standards, to submit these for full registration in 2003 (as was required for interim registration, mid-2000). This model of standard-setting would allow greater freedom and responsiveness on the part of providers than the original SAQA model and would lighten the bureaucratic burden on providers. 
3. The classification of technikon qualifications 
   Traditional technikon qualifications have been described in this report as falling under the following generic qualification types: the Career-focused Certificate, Diploma, Bachelor’s Degree, Advanced Bachelor’s Degree and Structured or Research Master’s Degrees. Universities can also offer these qualifications. If the ‘nested approach’ mentioned above is adopted, then its logic implies that the B.Tech and MTech will, for example, be classified as designated variants of the Career-focused Advanced Bachelor’s and Master’s Degrees. It is important that the technikon community and its stakeholders respond to this proposal.   
4. The meaningfulness and appropriateness for labour market needs and employment purposes of the proposed qualification types 
   This report proposes a number of new qualification types. Their meaningfulness and appropriateness for labour market needs and for employment purposes remains to be tested. Further discussion is invited in particular on the following new qualifications: 

• The General Diploma in the General Track – this proposal for 240 credit (2 year) exit-point from the General Bachelor’s Degree needs to be discussed and its relevance to labour market needs and for employment purposes needs to be tested.
• The Advanced Career-focused Bachelor’s Degree – this is a deliberate widening of the traditional category of professional qualifications to include innovative, career-focused and often Mode 2 type programmes such as an Advanced Bachelor of Tourism, Environmental Studies or International Relations.   
• The Professional Master’s Degree – this is proposed to be pegged at Level 8: PG2 because it requires no sustained research component (which is a requirement for Level 8: PG3). The CHE’s Academic Policy Task Team suggests that most MBAs, LLMs and other professional degrees that do not have a research requirement should fall under this qualification type. (The DoE will have to indicate how it will approach the funding of these professional degrees).   
• The Postgraduate Diploma – there was an unresolved debate within the CHE’s Academic Policy Task Team as to whether this qualification type should sit in both tracks, the General and the Career-focused, or only in the latter. This debate involves the status and nature of the Honours degree and whether this degree should be the normal or an exclusive route to master’s level study.
• The Master’s Diploma – linked to the point above, is the issue of the naming of an exit-point from a Structured or Coursework Master’s Degree. Traditionally this has been termed a Postgraduate Diploma. However, the Academic Policy Task Team has chosen to use this term at Level 8: PG1 and therefore proposes a new term for this kind of qualification at Level 8: PG2. The acceptability of this term plus the proposal that a Diploma can consist of only 120 credits (SAQA’s regulations require 240 credits) should be further debated.   
• The range of Certificates to be offered in the Articulation Column – the naming and more important, function and feasibility of these proposed qualifications requires further discussion.   
  In general, then, there are macro issues, such as the overall outcomes-based curriculum paradigm and the proposal for a two-track framework with an Articulation Column in between, and micro issues, such as those listed immediately above, that require comment, debate and resolution. 

(Prof.) Saleem Badat 
Chief Executive Officer 
Council on Higher Education

Pretoria, 16 November 2001