Does anyone have any info about the Accrediting Commission of Career Schools and Colleges (ACCSC)? I was looking over a brochure from Full Sail University, a media arts school in Florida that issues bachelors and masters degrees. They list accreditation from ACCSC. I assumed this was a bogus accreditor but in looking over the web site of ACCSC, they claim approval from the US Dept. of Education. How come we have heard very little about them on these boards? Could there be a national accrediting agency that's even lower on the totem pole than the DETC?
They have been around for a long time. They were formerly known as ACCSCT and only accredited up to the bachelors level. It looks like they have changed their name slightly and are now recognized to accredit up through the masters level. http://ed.gov/admins/finaid/accred/accreditation_pg7.html It's not bogus. We don't talk about it much because its schools don't seem to offer very much DL and it has only accredited at the associates and bachelors levels. Maybe that's changing. I don't think that it's lower on the totem pole than DETC exactly. In some ways it's higher, since it accredits B&M schools. It has accredited some schools that I like, such as Expression College (another media arts school) and the well-regarded California Culinary Academy. The ACCSCT schools haven't really tried to compete with the conventional university sector the way that DETC schools have. These schools don't emphasize degrees so much as practical skills. Some of them are good at what they do.
In addition to DETC and ACCSC, there's also ACICS which doesn't get much mention here ... As Bill said it's a legit accreditation ... Full Sail is fairly well known in the video games industry (I remember years back there was a big article about the school in EGM or one of the other big gaming mags) but I'm not sure what their rep is like among other fields. Also, they are QUITE expensive from what I remember.
