March 01, 2011

Accountant's body assesses higher education standards

As we had alluded to way back in 2009, regarding the shoddily put together idea instigated by the FLP mafia, to illegally and treasonously force a niche (read customer base) for themselves in the higher education sector, the proof is always in the pudding.

Accountants are now scrutinizing the quality of courses currently being offered by the Fiji National University, the University of Fiji and the University of the South Pacific understandably to ensure that the profession as a whole maintains robust standards. It won't take a genius to guess which institution/s will not be up to par.

No other professional body in Fiji has done the same yet.

Of concern however is the fact that many taxpaying citizens continue to be duped and flock to the cheap deals being offered by these fly-by-night operators while sacrifice valuable retirement funds.

Todate the illegal and treasonous manipulation by the Fiji National University has raised eyebrows at their couping of a regional body ie the Fiji School of Medicine (meaning that it is a CROP agency of similar status to the Forum Secretariat), as well as the Trade and Productivity Authority of Fiji (TPAF) which is now primarily the cash-cow of FNU funded by all organisations via mandatory levies.

In other words, all organisations in Fiji who are bound by law to pay levies to TPAF are subsidizing against their knowledge and will, a university that should otherwise compete with the rest on an even playing field. 
Expert assesses accounting degrees
Elenoa Baselala
Saturday, February 05, 2011

THE Fiji Institute of Accountants has brought in an expert to assess locally offered accounting degrees.

Retired Australia National University Business and Economics dean Professor Keith Houghton arrived in the country a few days ago to do the job.

A key part of the mission of The Fiji Institute of Accountants (FIA) is to ensure the quality and educational relevance of accounting degrees awarded to students in Fiji.

Professor Houghton, a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in Australia and of CPA Australia was pleased to return to Fiji to assist in the important quality assurance process. He would start the process with the Bachelor of Commerce and Bachelor of Accounting degrees at the Fiji National University (FNU) this month.

The process to assess the degrees of the University of the South Pacific and the University of Fiji would begin in July.

"The accreditation process involves a careful examination of the educational content of each of the core subjects in each of the degrees and key elective subjects" Professor Houghton said.

"We will look at the quality of delivery of educational offerings, the type of assessment used, the resources available for students and staff, the use of industry attachments and the university's own quality control process."

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

The assessment of a programme ie Acctg programme by an independent, qualified person is not new. This is how universities ensure that its graduates are competitive internationally. A quality assuarance aspect & any assumption otherwise is misguided. Maybe what should be of concern is the conflict of interest between the FIA and the tertiary universities, USP in particular. ie the same person(s) who sits on one side, also advises on the other.

Keep The Faith said...

@ Anon: If there is indeed a conflict of interest between the FIA and USP, there are ample processes in place available to members of FIA and the USP Council to address this. We suggest you take this up with them.

The issue at hand relates to how 2 so-called university's have forced themselves into the limelight using taxpayers money and without any form of due diligence or parliamentary oversight.

With all the hyped up programmes that FNU and UoF are rolling out, the biggest signal of "quality" is how many international universities recognize their qualifications or would be able accept cross-credit applications from them -- not many we're guessing.