Regional accreditation

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Regional accreditation map

Regional accreditation is the educational accreditation of schools, colleges, and universities in the United States by one of twelve regional accrediting agencies. Each regional accreditor oversees the vast majority of public and private educational institutions, both not-for-profit and for-profit, within its region. Their primary function is accreditation of post-secondary institutions, though there is a limited amount of accreditation of primary and secondary schools.[1][2][3] Regional accreditation is much older, and now accredit proprietary, vocational-technical, and single-purpose institutions as well.

List of regional accreditors

The following are the 12 active regional accrediting agencies for educational institutions in the United States:[4][5]

Some regional agencies have full accrediting authority for grade schools (primary and secondary), 2-year colleges, and 4-year colleges and universities (postsecondary). Both the northwestern and mid-Atlantic regions divide responsibility between two separate accreditation agencies with one focusing on primary and secondary schools and the other focusing on postsecondary institutions.[8][9][10] In the western region, there is a separate commission that accredits 2-year colleges.

History

The regional accrediting agencies were established in the late 19th and early 20th centuries in response to a perceived need for better articulation between secondary schools and higher education institutions (the school offered the courses the college needed applicants to have taken; this helped colleges and universities evaluate prospective students).[11][12] The New England Association was formed in 1885 by a group of schoolmasters of secondary schools. The Middle States Association formed in 1887.[11] The faculty of Vanderbilt University led the establishment of the Southern Association in 1895, and the North Central Association was organized the same year at a meeting of 36 administrators of midwestern schools, colleges, and universities.[11][12] The Northwest Association of Secondary and Higher Schools (predecessor of the two organizations that now serve that region) was formed in 1917 and the Western Association was founded in 1923.[11] Initially the main focus of the organizations was on accreditation of secondary schools and establishment of uniform college entrance requirements.[11][12]

Accreditation first emerged as a regional rather than national activity because it typically involved site visits, and the fastest transportation available at the time was the railroad.

Regional accreditation vs. national accreditation

Regionally accreditor categories of higher education institutions are predominantly academically oriented non-profit or state-owned institutions.[13][14][15] Nationally accredited schools are predominantly for-profit and offer vocational, career or technical programs.[13][14][unreliable source?]National accreditation is used in the non-profit sector for specific programs, such as nursing.

Every college has the right to set standards and refuse to accept transfer credits.[16] However, if a student has attended a school that is not regionally accredited, it may be difficult or impossible to have the credits, or even the degree earned, recognized by a regionally accredited college.[14] A 2005 study by the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) found that, in making decisions on credit transfer, about 84 percent of U.S. higher education institutions considered whether the sending institution is accredited, and many had policies stating that they would accept credits only from regionally accredited institutions.[17] About 63 percent of institutions told the GAO that they would accept credit from any regionally accredited institution, but only 14 percent similarly accepted credits from nationally accredited schools.[17] Regional institutions are reluctant to accept credits from nationally accredited institutions due, in part, to national accreditors' less stringent standards for criteria such as faculty qualifications and library resources.[17] Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.Students who anticipate transferring credits from a nationally accredited school to a regionally accredited one are advised to verify that the regionally accredited school will accept the credits before they enroll in the nationally accredited one.[13][14][16][unreliable source?]

In general, the names of U.S. post-secondary institutions and their degree titles do not indicate whether the institution is accredited or the type of accreditation it holds. Rules on this topic vary from state to state. Regulations of the Tennessee Higher Education Commission require that post-secondary institutions in the state of Tennessee must be regionally accredited to use the word "university" in their names, and that a school lacking regional accreditation may not use the word "college" in its name without adding a qualifier such as "career", "vocational", "business", "technical", "art", "Bible", or "Christian". Tennessee rules also specify that only regionally accredited schools can issue "liberal arts" degrees or degree titles such as Associate of Arts or Science and Bachelor of Arts or Science.[18]

See also

References

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External links

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