New Delhi (EMS). Now arts and commerce students will also be able to graduate in science. For this, UGC is going to make changes in the course by constituting a committee of experts.
Undergraduate courses in universities across the country, ie degrees awarded for graduation, can be renamed. Under the new policy being made by the UGC, the college will also be able to provide Bachelor’s degree in Science subjects to the students of Arts and Commerce. According to the expert committee of UGC, if a student has earned all the necessary credits for a four year program in three and a half years, then that student should be considered eligible to get the degree.
Actually, the expert committee of UGC has recommended this new change. Under the National Education Policy 2020, the UGC had constituted a committee to review the degree nomenclature. Now this committee has given its recommendation. According to the UGC, the new four-year undergraduate degree program may be introduced as a Bachelor of Science (BS) degree. With this, students will be able to earn Bachelor of Science (BS) degree despite graduating from Arts, Management and Commerce streams. If the students of Arts, Commerce or Management choose the subject of science as per their wish, then they will be able to get the degree of Bachelor of Science for this course.
At present, the University Grants Commission allows universities to award B.Com degree for subjects like Accounts and Commerce. BA degree in Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences and allows students to graduate in science subjects to award BSc degree. However, this expert committee of UGC has not allowed the use of BA and MA for science programmes.
UGC is sharing the recommendations of its five-member committee in the public domain for feedback. It is noteworthy that in the last week of May last month, the report of the committee was discussed in a meeting of the UGC. After deliberations, the Commission has decided to publicly share its recommendations for feedback before finalizing the new degree names. According to the UGC, the four-year undergraduate degree program will be called BA Hons, BCom Hons, or BS Hons i.e. these courses will have honors attached to their names.
At the same time, honors will also be attached to the name of the four-year research programmes. Such BA programs will be known as BA Honors with Research and B.Com programs will be known as B.Com Honors with Research. The expert committee has recommended abolition of the MPhil programme. Despite these new names and changes, the UGC’s expert committee has said that the new names of the degrees will be applicable only prospectively. Even after the new nomenclature is used for the various degrees, the old degree names will continue for the time being i.e. the existing 3-year undergraduate Honors degree program will continue with the newly implemented 4-year Honors degree program.
