Unaccredited community college in my neighborhood - Northeast Lakeview College

I had no idea that there was an unaccredited school in my backyard. I thought they were good to go, as a member of the Alamo Community College system.

Didn't even realize it until I saw the news story about their president retiring.

Northeast Lakeview president set to retire - San Antonio Express-News

Alamo Colleges : Northeast Lakeview College : Accreditation

For the most part, this probably won't matter to their students, as most students are either trying to get a job locally, or transfer to a school within the state of Texas, and they apparently have transfer agreements in place for that.

I've not worked a school accreditation before, so I have no idea how long this is supposed to take.

The campus looks great. I go on walks there all the time.

 

Hmm. My understanding was that when NLC first opened, that it was working off of San Antonio College's accreditation. I thought that would continue until it obtained its own accreditation. Texas A&M San Antonio was opened as a branch of Texas A&M Kingsville so that it could be accredited. To me, the whole thing is stupid. If ACCD really wanted a campus on the NE side of San Antonio, then they could have just built another campus for one of the existing colleges. St. Philip's College has two campuses on the opposite ends of town.

A few years ago, there was an article about how ACCD wanted to put all of the colleges under one accreditation so that they wouldn't have these issues. This idea was shot down by the communities because they thought the colleges would lose their individual identities. How dumb. Palo Alto College will still be Palo Alto College whether it has its own accreditation or is working under ACCD's accreditation. I don't see how who the accreditation belongs to will affect any of the colleges' "uniqueness." Almost all of the programs that are offered by all of the colleges i.e. business administration have the same curriculum. There is a slight difference between the required courses for the criminal justice programs, but everything else is pretty much exactly the same. If you're an online student, chances are that you are taking courses from multiple colleges. I have credits from all of the Alamo Colleges except for Northeast Lakeview. Sometimes, I would even forget which college I was taking a course from because the system is so integrated.

This leads me to another gripe I have with the system. Because of the SACS rule that you must complete 25% of your credits at the college you're graduating from, you are limited to how many courses you take from a college that is not your home school. You can complete 25% of your credits at the Alamo Colleges, but if 25% don't come from one college (your home school) e.g. Northwest Vista, you will not be able to graduate. The purpose of being able to take credits at any college is to make it easier for students to find open sessions. If a student is worried about the 25% rule and all of the sections are closed at their home school, they will have to wait another term even though there are open sections at the other colleges.