The education ministry has published an advertisement in different newspapers, calling applications from eligible persons for the vice-chancellor positions at the Khulna University of Engineering and Technology and the University of Barishal.
This is the first time advertisement has been published to call applications for the VC position, said ministry officials.
On Thursday the advertisement was published in different national dailies, including New Age.
Earlier, on June 4, the Secondary and Higher Education Division under the ministry issued a notice mentioning eligibility for the positions.
According to the advertisement, applications are invited from the Bangladeshi citizens for the appointment of vice-chancellor at the Khulna University of Engineering and Technology and the University of Barishal.
For detailed information, including eligibility and other conditions for the positions, please refer to the notice board menu of the web site (www.shed.gov.bd) of the Secondary and Higher Education Division of the education ministry, the advertisement said.
The advertisement is signed by the chairman of a search committee formed to make recommendations on the appointment of vice-chancellors to the country’s public universities.
Earlier, on May 18, the ministry formed the high-level five-member search committee headed by education adviser Chowdhury Rafiqul Abrar.
The adviser on June 4 at an opinion sharing event said that university vice-chancellors would be appointed by publishing advertisements in newspapers and accepting applications from eligible candidates.
University Grants Commission of Bangladesh member professor Mohammad Tanzimuddin Khan, who is also one of the search committee members, told New Age that earlier at Dhaka University, Rajshahi University, Jahangirnagar University and Chittagong University, the vice-chancellors were appointed by the chancellor, which is the president, for a period of four years from a panel of three persons nominated by the senate of the university concerned.
In cases of other public universities, there was no such fixed process and the successive governments appointed vice-chancellors as per their wishes through the chancellor, he said.
‘We have introduced a new system by setting some eligibility for the vice-chancellors as there were no criteria for them before,’ he said.
Replying to a question professor Tanzimuddin said that they had set an example for the next political government regarding the appointment of vice-chancellors based on such eligibility, not based on their party loyalty.
He mentioned that this was the first time applications were called for the position through publishing advertisement on dailies while earlier in 2007-2008 during the period of a caretaker government, a search committee had been formed for the same purpose.
In the ministry’s June 4 notice, the educational eligibility for the KUET vice-chancellor is the Doctor of Philosophy degree in engineering and technology from any recognised university and for the Barishal University vice-chancellor is the Doctor of Philosophy degree from any recognised university.
In terms of professional experience, the candidates need to be professor at any recognised university with minimum 20 years of teaching experience or minimum 15 years of teaching experience with five year’s research.
The candidates will have to have experience in administrative work, including experience in university administration operation or management, especially academic planning, financial management, student welfare and leading academic activities.
Experience in fulfilling academic or administrative duties in any well-known foreign university will be recognised as additional eligibility.
The candidates need to have significant numbers of publications or research papers or textbooks in the internationally recognised journals (Q1 to Q4 classes).
Recognition as scholar in the international arena will be considered as additional eligibility. The minimum age of the candidates is 45 years.
The interested candidates are asked to send applications with all documents to the senior secretary of the Secondary and Higher Education Division of the education ministry at the Bangladesh secretariat in Dhaka by 5:00pm on June 26.
Currently the country has 55 public universities.
After the fall of authoritarian Sheikh Hasina-led Awami League regime on August 5, 2024, amid a student-led mass uprising, the vice-chancellors of almost all of the public universities resigned and the interim government later appointed new ones to the positions.
Source : NEW AGE