Document Number: ACC-SOP-04-03
Version Number: 1.0
Effective Date: 01 July 2024

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SOP for the Board on Accreditation Decisions

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1.0 PURPOSE OF THIS DOCUMENT

The purpose of this document is to establish the decision-making process of the Board while evaluating undergraduate engineering programs.

2.0 SCOPE OF THIS DOCUMENT

This standard operating procedure (SOP) is applicable for the Board to decide on accreditation applications from undergraduate engineering programs of Higher Educational Institutions (HEI). The SOP applies to programs reviewed under both V2.2 and V3.0 of accreditation criteria (ACC-MAN-02).

3.1 The Board

• Takes accreditation decisions and their duration based on the information provided in the working paper and interviews of the Evaluation Team Chair and Sectoral Committee Chair.

4.0 DEFINITIONS AND ACRONYMS

See ACC-MAN-06 for definitions and acronyms.

5.0 SPECIFIC PROCEDURE

Step 1
The Board reviews the working paper circulated by the BAETE Secretariat and notes the recommendations and evaluations of the Evaluation Team (QAC moderated) and Sectoral Committee’s evaluation.

Step 2
The Board queries the Evaluation Team Chair, the Quality Assurance Cell Chair and the Sectoral Committee Chair in cases of disagreements and where the Board finds inconsistencies in findings and evaluations.

Step 3a (For programs applying following Accreditation Criteria V2.2)


The Board decides based on the following decision matrix:

Evaluation	Decision
Deficiency in one or more criteria	Not to accredit
Weakness in more than three criteria	Not to accredit
Weaknesses in one/two/three criteria with no deficiencies in other criteria	6-year conditional accreditation with an interim visit before the end of year 3
No weakness or deficiency in any criteria	6-year accreditation

Step 3b (For programs applying following Accreditation Criteria V3.0)
The nine accreditation criteria are subdivided into two groups.
Group A: Curriculum and Teaching-learning Processes, Program Outcomes and Assessment, Continuous Quality Improvement
Group B: Program Educational Objectives, Interactions with the Industry, Students, Faculty, Governance, Finance and Safety, and Academic Facilities and Technical Support

The Board decides based on the following decision matrix:



Evaluation	Decision
Deficiency in one or more criteria	Not to accredit
One or more weaknesses in Group A	Not to accredit
Four or more weaknesses in Group B	Not to accredit
Three or less weaknesses in Group B	6-year conditional accreditation with an interim visit before the end of year 3
Weakness in safety (Criterion 8 (iv))	Conditional accreditation: duration depends on meeting the conditions above; Accreditation commences when the safety issue has been resolved within six months of the visit (BAETE makes an interim visit). If the identified issues are not resolved within six months, the program gets a Not to Accredit decision.

6.0 FORMS/TEMPLATES TO BE USED

None

7.0 EXCEPTIONS

None

8.0 REVISION HISTORY