Two Schools Lapse on Accreditation

Discussion in 'Accreditation Discussions (RA, DETC, state approva' started by LearningAddict, Jan 27, 2013.

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  1. BillDayson

    BillDayson New Member

    I'm inclined to agree. While I don't directly know the reasoning that went into WGU's decision, I'm guessing that it's due to their desire to avoid all the work and expense associated with maintaining multiple institutional accreditations. One is enough.

    The reason that they selected a regional accreditor instead of DETC is most likely the fact that regional accreditation is more widely recognized. But people probably shouldn't conclude that DETC accreditation is meaningless or that DETC accredited programs are universally inferior to RA accredited programs.

    When it comes to generic degrees, the check-the-box situations where all that matters is whether or not somebody has a degree, I think that some employers care a great deal and others don't care nearly so much. Some go to the trouble of verifying applicants' graduation and university accreditation. But it's the fact that others don't take even that minimal step that accounts for degree-mill degrees (and old-fashioned lying) enjoying their occasional successes. When employers do check, they might have an RA-only policy or they might not. Some will be happy with any recognized accreditation, while others might want to see a specialized accreditation. And obviously in licensed professions, there's the whole licensing-board thing. The accreditations that matter in these situations are the ones that the boards recognize as license-qualifying. (Those are typically specialized accreditations.)

    When it comes to degrees that are in no way generic, especially high-end research PhDs, that's probably true in most cases. Hiring committees will consist of specialists in an applicant's field. They will already be thoroughly familiar with the programs that are active in their narrow area of expertise. The committee's interest in a particular candidate will probably focus more on who he or she worked with. Interviewers will want to see recommendations. They will want to probe what the candidate's thinking is and what their approach might be on whatever highly-technical subjects the candidate is being hired to work on or teach.

    This was probably part of the reason why some very prestigious doctoral schools like Rockefeller University, the Sloan Kettering Cancer Institute and the American Museum of Natural History chose NYRegents accreditation over regional accreditation. They seem to have concluded that their choice of a non-RA accreditor wouldn't materially impact the professional employability of the kind of doctoral graduates that they produce.
     
  2. Lerner

    Lerner Well-Known Member

    With in DETC we have better schools who are small and their programs are reasonably priced.

    I think comparing small number of schools to huge # of RA's is not necessary.
    For some DETC accredited degree from better NA school works.

    Roben is my friend, he tried hard and failed at state university. For some reason maybe he didn't had what it takes I don't know. I told him to try something a little
    less structured, more flexible. He transferred his credits to an NA DL school.
    Earned his Bachelors in Computer Information Systems with Networking wile working for a telco company running fiber cable etc. Also the program in the college prepared for basic computer certs such as A+, Network+, Project+, Security+.

    Today he is working in a major healthcare provider IT division infrastructure engineering team, very happy with his six figure ( with yearly bonus) income (started as contractor making 40$ an our was converted to Full Time Employee making 85K Sal + Bonus after one year).
    The degree served him well. It was less pressure then state university and highly flexible, he did one class at the time. An average class would be 5 to 6 weeks.
    The cost to complete the degree after transferring credit was about 5000 $.

    For Roben and since then 12 people who followed his path, DETC accredited World College was the answer. All of the 12 are employed in the field of their study, in few months they paid for their degrees, and wile attending college all they paid is 100 or 125 $ a month.

    For Roben this was what he needed. He could care less that the degree is not RA.
    Many of his friends who are in state universities had less successful outcomes for different reasons. Some are at the moment because of slow economy are taxi drivers with state university degree.

    The % of new graduates with degrees is much higher then new jobs that required degrees.

    But this is another discussion, more and more Taxi drivers have Bachelors degree today.
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Feb 2, 2013
  3. Kizmet

    Kizmet Moderator

    I'm sorry if I'm misunderstanding but I think that whole "agree to disagree" thing happened a long time ago. It's just that every once in a while some newbie brings up the issue and people feel compelled to trot out all the old arguments again.

    I think that things are slowly shifting in favor of DETC. I don't know if DETC schools/degrees will ever be seen as being equivalent to RA and frankly, I don't know if it matters. I have no problem with the idea that some (maybe a couple) of DETC schools/degrees are seen as being equivalent to some (more than a few) RA schools/degrees. I think that one mistake that DETC proponents make is not arguing about specific accreditation criteria (for example, the amount of money in the bank, the number of full-time tenured faculty, the number of books in the library, etc.). These are interesting criteria but, in my opinion, they do not necessarily impact the quality of instruction/quality of learning. I've imagined that these are some of the basic reasons that schools do not seek RA status although clearly I don't actually know this to be the case.

    One of the oldest and most valid/reliable points of debate on this topic is the question of utility. To what extent is the degree useful. Lerner, just a few minutes ago related a story of his friend who found his DETC degree to be quite useful. Clearly that's great to hear. At the same time, Dr. Bear and Rich have pointed out that objective measures indicate that employers see a difference between RA and DETC degrees and prefer RA degrees. In general then this makes DETC degrees less useful as they will get you through fewer doors. Similarly, we know that many RA grad schools are reluctant to accept DETC degrees and many RA universities are reluctant to accept credit transfers from DETC schools. To me that means that the people who do this stuff for a living, people who spend their careers evaluating schools, programs, degrees, transcripts, etc. often times do not see these programs/degrees as being equivalent. You may think that's unfair, unjust, inaccurate or whatever but it remains the truth in this day and age. This means that in this regard DETC degrees are less useful. So maybe you don't care if your Harrison Middleton degree won't get you into XYZ Regionally Accredited University because you don't want to go to grad school anyway. But the fact remains that there are A LOT of people whose opinions matters in this sort of situation (unlike my own opinion) who think these two sets are not equivalent. That's reality and it's reality whether I like it or whether you like it. That's my position. It's just a reflection of reality, the way the world actually is today. Are there exceptions? Of course. Do you want to take the plunge? Be my guest. Just like with Lerner's friend, I'm always happy to hear a success story. Just do it with eyes wide open and having a solid grasp of the risk/reward profile.
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Feb 2, 2013
  4. Randell1234

    Randell1234 Moderator

    These posts get so old....all I think of is Groundhog Day!

    I teach for an NA school and they do not "need" me to list my NA degrees, only RA degrees. Isn't that odd?
     
  5. Lerner

    Lerner Well-Known Member

    Some NA universities and colleges state that NA degrees are not intended to make people teachers in Universities that the degrees are applied to the professions and teach people how to practice rather then how to teach.

    They say (Cal Southern is one) that NA degrees are focused for practitioners and also for trainers who train practitioners. They are not geared toward teaching in university but training for vocation they are really good as they are more practical.

    Don't know how it will be in the future but today the following is good to know:
    Per Dr. Rich Doudlas

    Acceptance of DETC, NA degrees

    Federal government (civilian)--yes
    Military--yes, usually
    State and local governments--lots of them, yes
    Private (commercial and not-for-profit)--hit-and-miss; I suspect more hits
    Academia (administrative)--hit-and-miss; I suspect more misses
    Academia (faculty)--almost always no


    There are ways to convert the DETC degrees to European Degree evaluated RA equivalent to US degrees.
    Found Equivalent by NACES Charter member evaluation service.

    One of my frinds is teaching in CA State college with such credential plus other career achievements he had at IBM, Oracle etc.
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Feb 4, 2013
  6. CalDog

    CalDog New Member

    California Southern University is currently DETC accredited. However, they began pursuing regional accreditation with WASC last year. They have already been recognized as "eligible" by WASC, but have not yet reached "candidate" status.

    If they succeed with WASC, nobody should be surprised if they let their DETC accreditation expire.
     
  7. Lerner

    Lerner Well-Known Member

    I'm all for it, the RA degrees will serve better the graduates.
    I think there was a window of opportunity for DETC to become programmatic accreditor.

    The smaller schools will continue to apply for DETC accreditation, but if they do reach eventually RA then as things are today DETC will not be value added.

    As to Cal Southern they will change the focus of their degrees to be more research oriented in addition to practitioner focus.

    I'm interested to know how their Doctorates will be handled. Did WASC recognized eligibility including Doctorates?
     
  8. CalDog

    CalDog New Member

    We only know what Cal Southern has announced:

    The move to WASC could pose a problem for California Southern's JD degrees. WASC has a policy against accrediting JD degrees unless they are approved by ABA or CalBar. California Southern's JD degrees lack such approval.
     
  9. Anthony Pina

    Anthony Pina Active Member

    As long as the US Dept. of Ed. and CHEA give DETC approval to offer degrees up through the doctorate (excluding PhDs), there is little incentive for DETC to move from being an institutional accrediting agency to a programmatic one. Programmatic accreditation is usually focused upon a discipline or technical field, rather than upon a method of delivery. If DETC went "programmatic," what would it be able to do that the regionals don't already do?
     
  10. Rich Douglas

    Rich Douglas Well-Known Member

    But that was my point. The whole purpose of having a DETC is to accredit schools with a particular delivery method: DL. So they're already in the business of being a specialty accreditor. But in this case, the specialty is DL instead of one or more academic (nor non-academic) disciplines.

    In fact, if they don't do it, then they're just a microcosm of what the RAs already do. The same thing, just shrunk down to a teeny, tiny size. But because of that size, they can't really exercise comparable oversight, can they? Nor do they try. That's why, no matter how many approvals they get, their accreditation will never measure up and the RAs won't accept them as equals. Nor should they.

    The DETC was once a champion of the little guy, the schools that couldn't get accredited by the RAs because of the way they delivered instruction. But those barriers are gone. It's now about income streams, financial stability, administrative integrity and, yes, instructional ability/quality. I offer that there is no longer a need for a DETC, except to accredit schools that can't get RA.

    If DETC is both second-rate and redundant--and I strongly argue that it is--then what could it do? Well, if it truly is the leader in managing the quality of distance learning, why not accredit schools' DL processes? Why not hold conferences, publish a journal, manage communication networks, promote DL to the rest of academia and beyond, and who knows what else? Why be the side door for schools to offer doctorates they could never get past an RA?

    If they love accrediting schools so much--and given that this particular need is still there--why not continue to accredit non-degree-granting DL schools? Those institutions have nowhere else to go, really. But accrediting some schools that can't get RA so they can offer doctoral degrees that do nothing to advance scholarship? (They likely do advance practice; I'd stipulate that without needing proof.)

    Could there be a school so good that it could meet its RA's standards, but just isn't big enough to get accredited and, therefore, needs DETC? And could that school offer such a process that its doctoral students and faculty were active members of the scholarship process and community? That's a narrow niche. Let's say there are a few schools like that. It's like the camel's nose under the tent, though. Now every Tom, Dick, and SCUPS (I know, I know, but an elephant never forgets....) gets in and starts slinging doctoral degrees that have very little to do with scholarship. (Can the graduates get their dissertations published by UMI/Proquest? Not that that's the only measure, but it's a basic one. I found exactly 3; 2 from Aspen and one from William Howard Taft.)

    I appreciate why DETC went away from its original mission of accrediting correspondence trade schools. The field of DL was exploding and the RAs weren't so quick on the uptake. In many cases, DETC was the only game in town. But that isn't the case anymore. Times have changed. DETC hasn't.
     
  11. Lerner

    Lerner Well-Known Member

    Maybe DETC has another area to expand to?

    The accreditation of Certification providers. PMI, Cisco, CompTIA and others.
    Not sure they need it or in the case of CompTIA that has ACE credit - RA colleges award credit for their certs.

    But maybe certs that delivered by DL? jus t an opinion, certs replaced the career diplomas in the way.


    Public Notice:

     
    Last edited by a moderator: Feb 5, 2013
  12. Lerner

    Lerner Well-Known Member

  13. SteveFoerster

    SteveFoerster Resident Gadfly Staff Member

    Accreditation not just being about academics is why there's still a role. Distance learning can be offered on an entirely different and more modest financial model than campus based learning can. Since finances are such an important component of regional accreditation, it makes sense that schools that are small but real that offer programs online should have somewhere to turn. Schools that go from national to regional accreditation aren't necessarily any better than they used to be from the standpoint of students actually learning stuff, they're just big enough to join the cartel.
     
  14. BillDayson

    BillDayson New Member

    Yeah, that's a good point. DETC's scope is already limited by its mission, accrediting distance learning schools. All of the other recognized accreditors, whether RA or not, seem to have the option of accrediting both DL and on-campus programs.

    All of the various institutional accreditors are precisely that: institutional accreditors. So all of them are going to be performing basically the same function that the regional accreditors perform. That applies to ACICS, ACCSC, TRACS, ABHE and the NYRegents as well as to DETC.

    Oversight of what? Finances? Administrative processes and structures? Academics? And what's been shrunk down to teeny, tiny size? The accreditor itself? The schools it accredits? (I recall John Bear once remarking about how he had visited WASC's headquarters in Alameda and was surprised by how small the office was.)

    I'm not convinced that small schools that don't have a lot of financing and complex administrations are therefore incapable of providing valuable education to students.

    I happen to know about a little "institute" here in California that offers a small number of classes occasionally, but isn't even California-approved. (It gets away with that because it doesn't offer any degrees or certificates, because it doesn't charge its students, because of its small size and religious focus.) But... it has a top notch faculty (PhDs from Stanford and the ivy league, a Berkeley doctoral candidate and a fairly famous European scholar). Interestingly another California-approved school accepts this thing's classes as a specialization in one of its programs (and lists the teachers as 'adjuncts'). And in turn, that California-approved school offers a degree jointly with an RA school that's nationally known in its field, which goes so far as to list the little institute's classes in its class schedule, awarding its students RA credit for completing them. But the thing is... this little institute doesn't have any physical facilities of its own (it borrows space when it needs it). It doesn't have any budget (its teachers work for free). There's no administration (since the half-dozen people involved simply make decisions by consensus). No procedures, no documentation, no nothin'. Nevertheless, the classes that they offer are probably among the best in the world in their narrow subject area (perhaps better than nearby Stanford's, for one).

    The moral of this little story is that finances, facilities and administrative procedures don't automatically equate to academic value. These are basically separate variables, whose correlation is going to be probabilistic more than apodeictic.

    I believe that smaller schools that are less financially and administratively endowed can sometimes offer very good classes, instruction that might even be better than RA classes on occasion.

    Is there something wrong with that? (Depends on what the reasons actually are for the inability to get RA, I guess.) This is why I like the alternative institutional accreditors. They represent the possibility of grass-roots academics, and of doing things in different ways, that adherance to an 'RA or no way' policy would suppress.

    Sure. Or something analogous to DETC. That's why I point to the example of the NYRegents. Why did the American Museum of Natural History and the Sloan Kettering Cancer Institute decide to get their in-house PhD programs NYRegents accredited as opposed to regionally accredited? My guess is that it was easier and less expensive, because the NYRegents didn't demand that they throw the same kind of resources into creating a costly and cumbersome university administration. These two examples are first and foremost a museum and a hospital, after all, and awarding degrees isn't their primary function.

    The NYRegents schools have blazed that trail and shown that it's viable. If DETC (or ACICS or any of the others) wants its doctoral programs to play in the same league as the high-end regional accredited programs, then these more obscure accreditors will need to add some credible doctoral research programs to their rosters. The most significant variable here isn't so much the accreditor as it is the quality of the programs themselves.

    I don't entirely disagree with you, Rich. I think that we can both agree that accreditors like DETC and ACICS aren't doing things the right way when it comes to doctorates.

    What I'd like to see is DETC pressuring any of its schools harboring future doctoral aspirations to put in research units NOW. Start collaborating with other researchers. Start publishing. That way, when it's time for the doctoral programs to roll out, the schools offering them won't be complete unknowns, total nonentities in their field. That's how the American Museum of Natural History did it, after all, despite not being RA. It succeeds not because of its highly obscure alternative institutional accreditation, but because it's the internationally known American Museum of Natural History and its new PhDs are already bathed in a reputation that was built up with a century of research.

    So DETC should tell all of its schools that if they want doctoral programs approved, or existing doctoral programs reapproved, then they will need to display some visible scholarship. ('Publish or perish'.) In fact, the regional accreditors probably should be telling low-end RA doctoral schools (including the familiar DL ones) the same thing.
     
  15. Rich Douglas

    Rich Douglas Well-Known Member

    IIRC, NY Regents is required in New York, regardless of other accreditation. I could be mistaken, of course.

    If (and it's a BIG "if") schools accredited by DETC were creating the same learning outcomes AND impact on scholarship (not just the individuals', but also the academic disciplines'), THEN I could POSSIBLY see a need for DETC. But.....

    If we're to consider DETC accreditation as comparable to RA, then why don't they apply the same standards? They don't, we know, which is why many schools can get DETC accreditation while not being able to sniff RA. But here's the rub: that doesn't mean the RAs are right. Perhaps it's DETC that gets it--and gets it right--not the RAs. Perhaps the schools in question are being unfairly excluded from RA?

    Nope. I'd buy the possibility if it wasn't for some of the real scoundrels DETC has accredited over the years. And we also have some pretty good anecdotal evidence that the DETC's process is less rigorous. (It certainly is shorter and without a candidacy process.)

    Case in point: US Open University. A good effort, created by the highly successful Open University of the UK. It opened in 1999 and was quickly granted (a) candidacy status by its RA and (b) full (there is no other kind) accreditation by DETC. Well, it didn't make it. It closed before it was accredited. Poor funding, curriculum difficulties, a lack of business savvy, a weakening economy, and a few more conditions combined to doom it. The RA was right--good school without the right stuff. DETC was wrong; the mess it accredited was the same mess that collapsed.

    The DETC isn't a rival league (like the old American Football League that filled a real gap in the marketplace so well and so competitively the NFL pressed for a merger). It's more like a minor league, but instead of feeding players to the Big Leagues it supplies schools. It's real, and in many situations the degrees issued are considered comparable, but it is a minor league overall.

    That's why I suggested specializing in DL delivery. Better to be a big fish in a small pond (and one fitting your supposed purpose anyway).
     
  16. CalDog

    CalDog New Member

    The Sati Institute is a good example of the kind of program that we would all like to see DETC accredit -- a small, specialized, academically rigorous program that doesn't have the budget or organization for RA. With a little effort, they probably could get DETC recognition, and could offer accredited DL coursework on topics like Therevada philosophy or the Pali language. And the odds are good that their credits would be accepted at RA schools towards degrees in religious studies, in the same way that DETC coursework from Catholic Distance University is accepted by RA schools.

    There's just one problem -- right now, DETC does not accredit Sati Institute, or many schools like it. So this is not an argument that helps DETC today. Hypothetically, yes, DETC could play a valuable role as an accreditor of small, high-quality, niche DL programs -- and I would be delighted if it did -- but for now that scenario has little existence except in our imaginations.
     
  17. Rich Douglas

    Rich Douglas Well-Known Member

  18. Lerner

    Lerner Well-Known Member

    DETC can create second accrediting commission that will provide programatic accreditation.
    DETC is an educational association located in Washington, D.C.
    The Council was founded in 1926 to promote sound educational standards and ethical business practices within the correspondence field.

    The independent nine-member Accrediting Commission of the DETC was established in 1955.

    So why not create Programmatic Accrediting Commission and rename the first one to Institutional Accreditation Commission?

    School can be accredited by IAC DETC wile Programs can be accredited by PAC DETC.

    ABET has different types of accreditation ETAC, ASAC, CAC, EAC.

    So DETC should have IAC and PAC and VAC - Vocational Accreditation Commission, CAC Certification Accrediting Commission.

    I emailed this suggestion to Mr. Lambert.
     
  19. Lerner

    Lerner Well-Known Member

    I also suggested to adopt Dr Rich Douglas position on delivery processes accreditation.
     
  20. truckie270

    truckie270 New Member

    Sorry, but I cannot think of any instance where there are accreditations given by various bodies where the terms "less stringent" does not equal inferior.
     

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