Intercultural Institute of California

This is a tiny specialized program that will only be of interest to a few people, but it's significant because it illustrates how a CA-approved school can find a back door to RA.

The Intercultural Institute of California in San Francisco started offering a CA-approved masters degree in Korean Studies in 1996. In 2002 they hosted a site visit from WASC. Apparently WASC was satisfied with their academic standard, but found them beneath the critical institutional mass necessary for accreditation. They only have a few students, only offer one major and their campus is a house.

So what IIC has done, apparently with WASC's blessing, is form a cooperative arrangement with the RA California Institute of Integral Studies, also in San Francisco. Students will have access to the teaching and administrative resources of both institutions, and degrees will be issued jointly.

So what you have is one of the few Korean Studies degree programs in the world, and probably the only one offered online.

http://www.iic.edu/

This seems to be an indication that CIIS has successfully made it through their own rough patch with WASC a few years ago. Now they are apparently sound enough to be trusted to help shepherd a smaller school.

It's also interesting as an indicator of what WASC thinking is on the recommended course for very small but academically credible CA-approved schools. The Institute for Buddhist Studies (the BCA/Jodo Shinshu seminary) has formed a similar relationship with the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley. It seems that WASC might want to see these little schools be taken under the wing of larger schools that can better provide administrative and student service functions.

This has obvious implications for a tiny CA-approved school like Berkeley's Western Institute for Social Research. I seem to remember David Yamada (where is he?) saying that WISR was told by WASC that it was too small (40 students) to accredit. Perhaps it needs to form a cooperative arrangement of its own.

 

thanks

I appreciate you posting your research on this, Bill.

thank you!

 

Interesting stuff. Thanks Bill!