Accreditations comparison

[Cofffeee]

Hi Can anyone please give me insight on this accreditations- IACBE, AASBI, CHEA, EDUQUA? Do they have any value? Is it acceptable in USA? Greatly appreciated for your help 

[DeanLewis]

That's a bit of a doozy, for sure. CHEA is not actually an accreditor, but an association of accreditors. An accrediting agency having full membership in CHEA is a good start, for potential recognition in the US. AFAIK there are not non-US accreditors that enjoy automatic and full acceptance in the US, rather "foreign credentials" are evaluated by independent organizations, on a credential-by-credential basis for equivalency and usage in academia and employment. For the most part though, unless you're in a skilled (note: licensed) profession, most employers wont blink twice (unless you're claiming a very advanced degree -- or several -- from obviously dubious institutions).

[Merlin]

To follow on to DeanLewis's post, IACBE ("International Accreditation Council for Business Education") is not an institutional accreditor but a programmatic accreditor. It doesn't warrant that the school itself meets any regional or national accreditation requirements, just that a business degree program meets or exceeds the IACBE's academic rigor requirements.

The IACBE is one of the three most "highly recognized" business program accreditors; it is also one of the newest and therefore not as well known. AACSB is generally considered the gold standard at research colleges, with ACSBP being the next best and typically focused more on professional degree programs. Apparently AASBI ("Association of Accredited Schools of Business International" formerly "Asian Association of Schools of Business International") is another business school program accreditor, though it appears to primarily focus on Asian business schools. Between that focus, and the fact that it was only established a mere 8 years ago, that probably explains why I've never heard of it.

That said, programmatic accreditation can be safely ignored in 99% of business degrees unless the student intends to move into a highly competitive graduate-level business degree program, gain a tenured teaching position at a university, or land a job at one of the top accounting firms (in such cases, AACSB is almost always the expectation and the others are ignored). Most hiring managers outside of academia or accounting only care if the degree is legit (institutionally accredited) and don't know or care about programmatic accreditation.

EDUQUA appears to be some kind of Swiss accreditation for adult continuing education. So, unless you're in Switzerland or planning to work there, you can probably safely ignore that.