Last month, David Boyd started a thread about the recent ACTA report and discussion of same by a Congressional subcommittee. I had ignored that thread because it degenerated into an RJT discussion. But today I finally looked at the report in more detail, and it's worth reviewing. Here's a link to a PDF document that's only 119 Kb (evidently not the full 15.5 Mb report mentioned in the original thread): Can College Accreditation Live Up to Its Promise? Also, here's a link to an article in the Chronicle about the Congressional subcommittee hearing: Lawmakers at Hearing on College-Accreditation System Call for More Accountability. (My apologies if these specific links have been posted previously: I simply couldn't face reviewing the tedious RJT/KW thread).
Food for thought. This article raises very concerns questions about the quality, or, lack thereof US voluntary accreditation. Perhaps legitimate unaccredited but state approved schools, such as those in CA (i.e., CPU, CCU, PW, FTU, SCUPS) demonstrate a viable alternative, because none of these schools are eligible for Federal Goodies. Therefore, the continued existence of these schools is primarily dependant upon the curricula’s they support. As the article describes, with such notable and serious flaws with regional accreditation, perhaps the role of the State Licensing/Registry/Approval vehicle should assume more significance. Should accreditation be abolished, and states assume control, following the development of Federal guidelines? The concept is intriguing. Just food for consumption. RJT
The opening statement of this report reads, "Academic accreditation is a subject that is rarely discussed." Perhaps the author isn't aware of the global DegreeInfo subculture--one which lives, moves and breathes accreditation.
Re: Food for thought. What would make the states more effective than the regional, national, and professional accreditors? They're track record of establishing and enforcing standards is shoddy at best. And they have the ultimate power to license--or unlicense--schools. I'm no big fan of the accreditors, but there is no evidence that 50 individual states will do a better job. Federal guidelines? Who would enforce the implementation of them by the states? They could tie a state's schools' eligibility for financial aid to compliance, but that would fail to distinguish between performing and non-performing schools in a state. Without a federal system and enforcement, the best alternative is the one we have. Sure, the accreditors can improve, but replacing them with state authorities is no answer.
I was struck by the comments in the Chronicle article complaining about the role that the states play -- especially the comment from UoP President Laura Palmer Noone that: ... state-based "educational bureaucracies" are an unwelcome obstacle for a geographically diverse institution because every state acts as if it invented education. The state-based difficulties, she said, create "a structural impediment to any real national initiatives" in accreditation.
Re: Food for thought. The states have utterly failed at education accreditation issues in the past. It is true that over the years there has been trend at the state level to clamp down on degree mills. The most successful laws that have done this are the ones that have made unaccredited schools illegal. All of the successful anti-degree mill state laws depend on RA in some way or another. Without the regional accreditation system this option wouldn't be available and we would be back at square one. State approved schools is just providing fertile ground for degree mills to thrive. Even if 49 of the 50 states had great laws that last state would be the hole in the dam that opens up the degree mill flood gate. The reasonable choices that I see are the current system or a federal system. The best way to improve the current system, IMHO, is to make the current voluntary system mandatory. Perhaps requiring new start up schools to operate only under an act of the legislature with a time limit for reaching accreditation and if a school loses its accreditation then it is shut down.
My pie in the sky idea is to reserve a dozen or so degree titles for RA institutions -- e.g. BS, BA, MS, MA, MBA, PhD, JD, PharmD, PsyD, MD, DDS, etc. Perhaps DETC would be approved to allow its accreditees to issue a subset of these degrees. It would be illegal for an institution to award any of these restricted degrees unless its accreditor were approved (e.g. by Dept of Education) to grant it that authority. Perhaps there should be some kind of temporary dispensation for pre-accredited schools. The award of degrees not on the restricted list (e.g. DPhil, DBA, ThM, ThD) would be subject to current rules (managed by the state bureaucracies).
I like Gert's suggestion a lot. The only objection I have is that the DPhil and the DBA are perfectly fine degrees that already mean something. I'd hate to see people's degrees devalued by the perception that they imply lower standards than other better recognized degree titles. The same objection applies to ThM and ThD degrees, of course, but in those cases court ordered religious exemptions would probably make government regulations impossible. So I would modify Gert's suggestion by requiring unregulated degrees to use entirely new names and titles invented for the purpose: "Scholar of Arts", 'Sch.A.', "Expert of Science", Ex.S.'.
But who is to say what is entirely new? But I agree that the restricted list could be expanded beyond the dozen or so I had in mind. I listed DPhil as unrestricted because I don't know of any U.S. university that uses this designation. I listed DBA as unrestricted because I see this on business cards -- but the people have some kind of database administrator certification rather than a doctorate. I listed ThM and ThD because, as Bill already pointed out, it's probably not fruitful to try to control strictly religious degrees in this way. I like the "Ex.S." Also perhaps "Scholar of Information Technology" would make a good unaccredited degree.
