TESU Wording Newly Friendly to DOED-Recognized Institutionally Accredited Credit

[Jonathan Whatley]

TESU appears to have recently reworded their policies to now state they accept credit "from entities accredited by institutional accreditors recognized by the U.S. Department of Education."

"Regional accreditation" is no longer stipulated directly, nor does it appear to be implied – for example, they don't stipulate a list of institutional accreditors they accept that just happens to be the traditional list of regional accreditors – in the main body text on the undergraduate catalog page Transfer Credit, the graduate catalog page Transfer Credit, or the Transfering Credit landing page in the Admissions section of the site.

There are several places on TESU's website that specify a regional accreditation requirement specifically, but generally they seem less official and may not have been updated, including in part Academic Credit FAQs and a 2016 blog post on NA vs. RA.

For admission to TESU master's programs, "The University requirement for admission to any master’s degree program is the demonstration of the completion of a bachelor’s degree from an institution recognized under our Transfer Credit Policy."

A regionally accredited master's is still at this time a stated requirement for admission to TESU's DBA and EdD.

"Institutionally accredited" absent any indication otherwise implies a superset that includes nationally accredited (NA).

This might open up some new degree planning options.

[Kab]

That a great finding. This can be really good for some people to finish a bachelor they started somewhere else or even to go to a RA Master coming from a NA Bachelor. I am sure you made a lot of people happy today!

[davewill]

It never made much sense to accept ACE credit but not NA credit. Can't wait to see someone actually succeed in transferring NA credit in. I wouldn't be too surprised if they slap some kind of credit limit like they do for ACE on NA credit, but they really shouldn't need to.

It's a shame that their Master's programs aren't more affordable.

[bjcheung77]

Someone should try, I think I read from an earlier post/thread that someone was successful in applying their NA credits. But I don't recall if those NA credits came from Genesis University, Penn Foster, or something else that already has ACE or NCCRS recommendation for credit. Someone may want to search the board as there may have been a post of this forum or the sister one...

[studyingfortests]

It's my understanding that regional accreditors are no longer bound to accredit schools only in their geographic regions, and schools can choose to see accrediation from an accreditor in a different region. Thus prompting the shift to the term "institutional accreditation" instead of "regional accreditation." But this, of course, then muddies the line between regional accreditors and other accreditors such as DEAC.

I agree with BJCheung. It would be interesting to see if this is a wording change, or an actual shift in policy.

[jch]

It would be a typical TESU move to change the wording of a policy without changing the practical application, or vice versa. Also interested in the impacts.