UGC- Recently, the University Grants Commission, in its directive, has mandated the creation of the Academic Bank of Credits for the students registered in Online & Distance Learning Courses (ODL). Academicians consider this decision a vital step as this will provide the proper and systematic management of the academic records, which becomes problematic as students enlisted in ODL courses often take a drop for a year or more due to different reasons.

Many incidents have been reported where the mark sheets of such students have been misplaced when they return after a long gap. In addition, students coming after a long gap fail to upload their assignments. The higher education regulator has instructed all the universities delivering online programmes to link the Learning Management System with the ABC portal. ABC is of the purpose as laid down in the National Education Policy NEP 2020, whose aim is to assure the interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary academic mobility of students.

Nageshwar Rao, the IGNOU vice-chancellor, said mandating an ABC account for ODL students is critical as students registered in these programmes have relatively less contact with their teachers in comparison to regular students. Now the credits that students gain will automatically be credited to their ABC account, which will deliver academic flexibility to students, and they can simultaneously seek any other course of their preference and continue their graduation as and when they want. Students registered in ODL courses often drop out for one year or more, and multiple times the instances of their mark sheets going missing have come to the forefront when they rejoin. In addition to this, students usually come up with complaints that they are not being able to upload their projects when they rejoin the course after the gap. Due to the mandating of ABC for ODL students, their academic records will be handled through an efficient system that will facilitate the entire procedure.

Nageshwar Rao added this effort by the UGC will also bring uniformity between distance & regular education in the country, and now more students will get enrolled in ODL programmes. Till now, we have enrolled 19 lakh students for the creation of their Academic Bank of Credits account.

Director of the Institute of Distance & Online Learning, Chandigarh University, Gurpreet Singh, said with ABC becoming compulsory for students enrolled in ODL courses, they will get academic flexibility. Now students enrolled in ODL courses will also be able to diversify their educational base as they can simultaneously pursue other programmes along with their graduation course, whose credits will be added to their ABC account. This decision is also in line with bringing in a practice of lifelong learning among the Online & Distance Learning Courses (ODL) educational ecosystem.

News Source: Times of India