In a major boost to technical education & engineering programs, India today joined a select group of 17 countries who are permanent signatories of the Washington Accord (WA). The meeting of the International Engineering Alliance of WA member countries met in Wellington, New Zealand this morning and gave India the signatory status with effect from today. Union Minster of Human Resource Development Smt Smriti Zubin Irani has congratulated the officials of the Ministry of Human Resource Development and the National Board of Accreditation, and said that “this will ensure highest quality assurance standards to be implemented in our technical and engineering programmes and provide global mobility to our engineering graduates.” She said that “Graduates having degrees, which have been so accredited, would have substantial international equivalence of their achievement levels across the signatory nations. This will substantially enhance their employment opportunities around the world”.
Washington Accord is an international agreement amongst prominent nations of the World, with the charter of promoting mobility and quality assurance of engineers across international boundaries. The charter requires that nations set up suitable accreditation standards, which would ensure a minimum quality of attainment for their engineering graduates. The Washington Accord was signed by the National Board of Accreditation, India, an accrediting body with the mandate for accreditation of engineering and other technical programs at all levels in the country and making technical education outcome based. The International Engineering Alliance (IEA), Secretariat of the Washington Accord, sent a Review Team in December 2013 and January 2014, to carry out a comprehensive review and audit of NBA accreditation systems and practices. The Review team submitted its report in March 2014.