Is this a legit accreditation?

Saw this listed as Barrington Universities newest iteration.

https://www.qahe.org/about/

Is this a real accreditation agency?

Also, Barrington will not die!!! How is Florida allowing them to operate? Sad.

 

Red flags:

• They mention ISO 9001 compliance as if that gives them any recognition
• They've signed a bunch of Memorandums of Understanding with organizations in Moldova, Kyrgyz Republic and Uzbekistan for an unclear purpose
• They are selling awards (e.g. Outstanding Program/Faculty/Institution Award for $400 + 5%)
• They claim to accredit organizations like Cica-International based in Florida, but QAHE does not appear in the list of recognized accreditors
• They claim to be "recognized" in Germany by FIBAA, but they don't appear on the FIBAA website, either as themselves or the European Institute of Management & Technology who they claim to accredit

I can't imagine this leads anywhere good.

 

List of accreditees is interesting

https://www.qahe.org/list-of-accredited-institutions/

 

Unrecognized accreditor accrediting junk schools. Not necessarily nefarious, but definitely garbage.

 

There are a few country government-accredited schools on the QAHE list, so it's not all junk.

 

Even if that's the case, one then has to ask themselves why schools already accredited would align with an unrecognized accreditor that accredits mostly junk schools. That doesn't look good for the credibility of those schools at all. At least schools that work with ASIC make a little bit of sense. ASIC has no legal authority as an institutional accreditor (but that unfortunately doesn't stop them from it), but does have value for immigration purposes. This QAHE outfit offers no benefit as an accreditor nor for immigration.

 

There are government-approved accrediting bodies and other types of accrediting associations. An accrediting association does not have to align itself with any particular country government, or even be approved by any official ministry. These associations are judged by the benefits bestowed to their members. I like the fact that you focused on the benfit side. I'd say that this is what QAHE should be judged on - the benefits delievered to their members. It could be the case that QAHE offers zero benefits in terms of providing institutional/programmatic recognition in the context of international degree evaluation. But there could be some marketing benefits (as the institution perceives it, even if we don't see it this way) or other types of rewards for QAHE-aligned institutions. I don't agree with the notion that mere existence of a government-accredited school on the QAHE list is a good reason for seeing that institution as a junk school, although questions about the propriety of the alignment are perfectly legitimate.

 

In the United States that's essentially true, but not always true everywhere else. The only nuanced difference there with the United States is that accreditors rely on recognition by the government rather than approval.

I can think of a few FCEs that might let a school from that fold pass, but none of them would be in NACES.

Oh, we see it. We've seen it many times. The benefit is that unaccredited schools can falsely present themselves as accredited and therefore more legitimate. It preys on the general public's lack of knowledge about these systems. The unaccredited schools that do this are fully aware of what they're doing.

I never made that notion.

Which is what I was getting at by stating "one then has to ask themselves why schools already accredited would align with an unrecognized accreditor that accredits mostly junk schools. That doesn't look good for the credibility of those schools at all."

Of course that doesn't mean a legitimately accredited school that does it is automatically junk, but it is a hit to its credibility. I can't see how any supposed benefit would outweigh the poor optics of being a legitimately-accredited schools aligned with an unrecognized accreditor that offers the school no greater authority or legitimate recognition.

 

Some time ago, I just came to the conclusion that (in the presence of real government accreditation), the additional association with an accrediting agency with a checkered past (QAHE, ASIC, Accrediting Commission International) would not be something that would serve as an obstacle to attending a school that I liked. I could still think of the alignment as undesirable, but it wouldn't be a serious factor for me.

 

I only feel this way now that I have an earned master's degree. If I want to learn Arabic or data engineering or something, I would be willing to consider an unaccredited school only because I'm more interested in the learning than I am in the piece of paper at the end.

 

In general, accreditation says, "We approve this."

In higher education, it is meant to say that the accredited school issues recognized degrees. Everything else, like the subject of this thread, is bullshit.

This is also the problem with proprio. The schools are recognized, but not the degrees. Thus, a school doing this could be considered both accredited or unaccredited, depending on what degree it issues. More bullshit.

 

Are those schools even aware they've been "accredited"?

I remember the "accreditor" for Columbia State listed all sorts of prestigious schools as being accredited by them, and none of them realized that had received such an honor.

 

I think that most of our board members would agree that getting QAHE accreditation doesn’t change the position of a school in terms of institutional recognition. The school remains unrecognized in that respect. I just go a bit further and assert that association with QAHE does not invalidate a legitimate school either.

I think that the “government-accredited” schools on their list are fully aware of QAHE. They were not listed by them as a fluke. While fake accrediting agencies have listed legit institutions to legitimize their own accrediting services, I don’t think that’s the case here. QAHE is not fake in this overt manner.

 

Hey, your back Sir!

 

I am, good to see you!