Serendipity35

Somewhat related to my previous post...

For now, it looks like accrediting agencies have been given a reprieve because the National Advisory Committee on Institutional Quality and Integrity has passed on any decision to break the connection between accreditation and federal funding. Those accrediting agencies very much want to maintain their role in determining a colleges’ eligibility that allows them to receive federal student aid programs.

But just how much the committee on accreditation, which was charged with the broad task of recommending how the nation’s accreditation system should be reshaped when the Higher Education Act is revised in 2013, will suggest changing the status quo was still somewhat unclear after two final days of discussion here. While committee members, under pressure from accreditors and colleges, agreed that the agencies should retain their role as the primary determiners of eligibility for federal financial aid, they still considered -- and many supported -- a host of other, smaller changes.
The committee’s draft report, published in October, presented a series of options and scenarios rather than making concrete recommendations. At its outset, two of three possible recommendations involved reimagining how accreditation works: separating accreditation from the eligibility process for federal student aid, or modifying the link between the two to create an “either/or” system wherein colleges would have to meet baseline criteria established by the government and then could pursue either accreditation or governmental certification.

Read more: http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2011/12/19/committee-higher-ed-accreditation-composing-its-final-report#ixzz1hCzoXMg4