Abstract
Higher Education in modern society seeks to preserve, transmit and advance knowledge and is committed to bringing change. As education needs to be more dynamic, self-corrective and self- invigorative, a rejuvenation of the system with a drive towards quality is the need of the hour. Assessment means the performance evaluation based on certain criteria. Quality assessment in higher education is defined as the totality of the system, resources and information devoted for maintaining and improving the quality and standards of teaching, learning, research and scholarship. This paper aims to assess the quality of higher education in Sikkim on five dimensions namely: Infrastructure, Core curriculum, Teacher, Research, and Evaluation. The quality of classrooms, library, laboratory etc. was assessed under ‘Infrastructure’. Under ‘Core curriculum’, curriculum’s utility, justification and relation to practical life were assessed. The quality and efficiency of teachers who are transacting the curriculum were assessed under the component ‘Teacher’. The fourth dimension i.e ‘Research was assessed, by collecting information on acquaintance of the teachers and students about current innovative research findings and seminar. Under the last dimension evaluation system of Higher Education was assessed. Data was collected using structured interview schedule from 50 students of various departments of Sikkim University who were selected using purposive sampling. Percentage analysis was done for evaluating the data. It was found that majority of the students had responded positively on all the dimensions. They expressed their satisfaction over the availability of well-equipped infrastructure, appropriateness of curriculum, resourceful teachers, and evaluation system of Sikkim University. Based on the findings some suggestions have been forwarded. Keywords: Quality assessment, Infrastructure, Core-curriculum, Teaching-learning, Research and development.
