Regional & National accreditation

[Cofffeee]

Hi all
Just want community option on this info. I recieved email from UoPeople about their regional accreditation process. The email mentioned 
"Kindly note: The US Department of Education recently decided that starting July 1, 2020, colleges and universities will no longer be distinguished by regional and national accreditation because all accrediting agencies are held to the same standards."
What are your thoughts on this decision?

[bluebooger]

fake .

[Cofffeee]

fake                            .

Fake what?

[xicovu]

I think there may be some more to it then "BS nationally accreddited school are now the same a Harvard", but it sounds like regional can now accredit nationally, as in a RA from the northeast can accredit colleges in the northwest.

https://www.insidehighered.com/views/202...al-opinion


I'm still trying to get details.

---

Maybe not:
https://www.theregreview.org/2020/02/25/...editation/

This is confusing. Any forum veterans who knows the in's and out's might be able to clarify for us.

[Cofffeee]

Yes it would be great

[bjcheung77]

Hmm, interesting... In short this is what was proposed (or what I think was proposed). There are pros & cons, but I would assume leaving it the way it is would be less confusing, but sometimes change is good (it depends).

The US Gov/DOE is proposing the six regional accrediting agencies to no longer be bound by their respective boundaries, as currently, they are only authorized to provide accreditation to institutions within their currently assigned areas (regions). I'm not sure why they would want this though...

In turn, it just means any new institution seeking accreditation can apply for one of the six instead of specifically choosing the accrediting agency associated with their state. This can be somewhat skewed if people only apply to one accreditation agency, why would there be a need for the other 5.

Note, this has nothing to do with currently nationally accredited agencies like ABHES, ACCSC, ACCET or DEAC and the National faith-based accrediting agencies such as AARTS, ATS, ABHE and TRACS. Even though the arms of these RA agencies reaches a national level, their accreditation will remain "different" than the Nationally Accredited agencies.

[Cofffeee]

I wonder what they tried to achieve with this regulation.... it will be interesting to see how it will change or if it will change anything at all for educational institutions and students

[xicovu]

They don't really have education's interest at heart I don't think, even if this ends up being a good thing. It's the politics of "getting rid of regulation" the same way Republican believe ACA should be regulated by Geography. I don't swing politics either way on this, I'm just speaking for the likely motive.

[videogamesrock]

It appears to remove the monopoly of a geographic regulator of the university. This would give schools more choice and ultimately drop cost of doing business.