RR-225-RC Building the Links Between Funding and Quality in Higher Education:: India's Challenge

India has joined a worldwide trend in which nations are seeking to improve the quality of their higher education systems by giving greater autonomy and accountability to lower levels of government (e.g., states) and to the higher education institutions themselves. India⁰́₉s 12th Five-Year Plan, released in December 2012, suggests a range of reforms to higher education to change the role of the national government from ⁰́command and control⁰́₊ to ⁰́₋steer and evaluate.⁰́₊ One approach that has proven effective in other countries is explicitly linking funding to well-defined quality measures and quality assurance processes. While India's 12th Five-Year Plan discusses the importance of quality improvement and funding, it does not discuss how quality and funding can be linked to support quality improvement under a ⁰́₋steer and evaluate⁰́₊ approach to governance. In this report, the authors review India⁰́₉s and other countries⁰́₉ efforts to reform their higher education systems and suggest seven policy actions that the Indian national government and other stakeholders can take to improve higher education by linking funding to quality.