Industry Report - Pacucoa

Chapter I

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

Higher education in Philippines is both highly diversified and pluralistic, where private Catholic institutes, coexist with Protestant non-sectarian establishments along with public institutions due to the unique history of the Philippines. It was realized by various private educators in 1951 of the need of accreditation to enhance the quality of education through a system of standards, continuous monitoring and implementation, and self assessment done on a voluntary basis. It was envisioned that through accreditation, appropriate guidance shall be provided to parents and students seeking higher education. Also, this shall enable greater co-operation among higher education institutions (HEIs). On this premise, PACUCOA was established to ensure quality accreditation for private non-sectarian HEI bodies.

This report aims to look at the accreditation process and the benefits as provided by PACUCOA, and its impact on private HEIs as part of the Industry Program commissioned at AIM. This report does an analysis of the current situation of the Accreditation process by studying the key macroeconomic drivers and the recent reforms and historical background on the Education system of Philippines. One of the key objectives is to meet the challenges of globalization and where strategies are especially complex because of expansion of markets beyond national borders. Therefore, education must help individuals to perform tasks for which they were not originally trained, to prepare for a nonlinear path, to improve their team skills, to use information independently and, finally, to lay the basis of complex thinking linked to the realities of globalization and a knowledge-based economy.

This report further traces the development of accreditation among HEIs in Philippines and PACACUA's relation with other bodies and international standards like Washington and Bologna Accord. The key industry players for Higher Education, SWOT Analysis and key success factors for Accreditation and quality improvement are discussed.

This is followed by recommendations to improving the current processes in PACUCOA and Higher Education in general with the aim of creating a Knowledge economy for Philippines in the increasing global world.

Chapter II

MACROENVIRONMENT CONTEXT OF HIGHER EDUCATION

Introduction

In the Philippines, education has always been one of the pillars of national development, given its capacity to provide the country with competent and skilled manpower. Viewed as a key investment