University Crisis: 82% of Degrees May Not Be Registrable, According to Aneaes

Paraguay's higher education system faces a critical juncture as a vast majority of university programs risk being unable to register degrees by 2028. The National Agency for the Evaluation and Accreditation of Higher Education (Aneaes) has issued a stark warning: 82.2% of the country's 2,565 active undergraduate programs are not accredited, potentially leaving thousands of graduates without registrable titles.

According to an Aneaes report submitted to the Ministry of Education and Sciences (MEC) and the National Council of Higher Education (Cones), only 456 programs currently hold valid accreditation. An additional 376 are in the process of evaluation. This means a mere 17.8% of all undergraduate offerings meet the accreditation standards required by law since 2003 and reinforced by regulations in 2016.

“

The Paraguayan higher education system enables much more than it evaluates.

The impending deadline of 2028, set by the MEC for the non-registration of unaccredited degrees, has amplified the urgency. Aneaes President José Duarte Penayo emphasized that while the mandatory nature of accreditation is not new, the consequence of non-compliance is a significant development. The agency has provided detailed data, institution by institution, to identify which programs are compliant and which are not.

The report reveals a pronounced disparity between public and private institutions. Public universities have managed to accredit 37.6% of their offerings, while the private sector lags significantly, with only 10.9% of its programs accredited. This data suggests that the bulk of the problem lies within private higher education institutions, which often represent a larger share of student enrollment. The situation raises serious concerns about the quality and recognition of degrees for a substantial portion of Paraguay's university graduates.

“

The new aspect is the consequence, that is, the non-registration of titles, which the MEC set for 2028. Therefore, this report individualizes, program by program and site by site, who complies and who does not.