Accreditation Reconsidered

Higher education is one of the most successful sectors in the nation at a time when much of the economy is struggling. Its quality has been buoyed by a long tradition of investment, both public and private, and by a healthy degree of autonomy from governmental control. America’s three governance innovations, citizen governing boards, shared governance, and accreditation, also have encouraged both quality and institutional autonomy in higher education. Accreditation has been a particularly important contributor to the institutional diversity and vitality of American colleges and universities. Most nations have a ministry of education that oversees institutions of higher education. But, such centralized control too often stifles innovation and quality. By contrast, the United States has long relied on private accreditors that use periodic peer assessments to support continuous quality improvement. Legal accreditation at the moment is out of step with most of higher education accreditation because of arbitrary limits placed on the participation of legal educators by the Council of the ABA Section on Legal Education and Admissions to the Bar. It is time for legal education to have a system of accreditation that is grounded on peer assessment, dedicated to improving, and not just assessing, the quality of legal education, and guided by the same peer governance structure that has worked so well for the rest of American higher education

The Architecture of Accreditation

Accreditation systems can be analyzed in terms of the designer’s choices in three dimensions. One dimension is purpose of accreditation, where purpose may relate to program quality or quality of outcomes. The second dimension consists of types of accreditation norms used to achieve these purposes. There are five principal types of norms available in this dimension: process-quality norms, output norms, power allocation norms, self-determination norms, and consumer-protection norms. The third dimension consists of degree of regulation, which includes prescriptiveness or extensiveness of regulation. A sound accreditation system will make choices along each of these three dimensions. Understanding the range of possible structures helps one design, revise, and effectively analyze accreditation systems

Is undergraduate programme accreditation influenced by educational public policy quality indicators? An exploratory study of the Chilean Higher Education quality assurance system

In Chile, as well as in most of Latin America, public policies for higher education have recently adopted a focus on quality assurance and accreditation systems. Uncertainty, however, still exists in terms of the quality assurance consistency in the current Chilean accreditation system, especially in terms of the relation between public policy quality indicators for higher education and their relation to accreditation outcomes. Therefore, the aim of this study was to make a first explorative attempt to investigate the relationships between these indicators and the results of undergraduate programme accreditation. We hypothesised that the public policy quality indicators of first-year drop-out rate, employment at graduation and ratio of actual to expected time to graduation would be strongly correlated to undergraduate programme accreditation as well as largely explaining its accreditation-year variance. By means of correlation and multiple regression analyses, we found small-sized associations, being first-year drop-out the only significant predictor of programme accreditation, explaining a 9.4% of its variance. These results raise questions regarding the consistency between the aims of public policy for higher education and the current accreditation system. This study should be of value to policy makers, managers and curriculum developers in terms of this initial analysis of the consistency between quality indicators and the accreditation system. Further research is necessary to make a systematic and in-depth assessment of the impact of quality assurance mechanisms to provide better rationale for making important decisions such as when defining the characteristics of the accrediting institutions as well as for establishing effective ways to achieve the proposed public policy objectives

Geology Programs and Disciplinary Accreditation

This report raises the question of whether accreditation may be coming to the geology discipline, and attempts to quantify the positions on accreditation of academic department heads/chairs. The study makes a distinction between institutional and specialized (or disciplinary) accreditation and explores attitudes toward both types. Results of the analysis are presented with a discussion of two methods of data interpretation, a multivariate analysis technique and the Chi square test for heterogeneity or independence. The report concludes that there is currently insufficient support for establishing disciplinary accreditation in geology. Educational levels: Graduate or professional

The Relationship Between Health Department Accreditation and Workforce Satisfaction, Retention, and Training Needs

BACKGROUND: To improve quality and consistency of health departments, a voluntary accreditation process was developed by the Public Health Accreditation Board. Understanding accreditation's role as a mediator in workforce training needs, satisfaction, and awareness is important for continued improvement for governmental public health. OBJECTIVE: To compare differences in training needs, satisfaction/intent to leave, and awareness of public health concepts for state and local health department staff with regard to their agency's accreditation status. DESIGN: This cross-sectional study considered the association between agency accreditation status and individual perceptions of training needs, satisfaction, intent to leave, and awareness of public health concepts, using 2017 Public Health Workforce Interests and Needs Survey (PH WINS) data. Respondents were categorized on the basis of whether their agencies (at the time of survey) were (1) uninvolved in accreditation, (2) formally involved in accreditation, or (3) accredited. RESULTS: Multivariate logistic regression models found several significant differences, including the following: individuals from involved state agencies were less likely to report having had their training needs assessed; staff from accredited and involved agencies identified more gaps in selected skills; and employees of accredited agencies were more aware of quality improvement. While state employees in accredited and formally involved agencies reported less job satisfaction, there were no significant differences in intent to leave or burnout. Differences were identified concerning awareness of various public health concepts, especially among respondents in state agencies. CONCLUSIONS: While some findings were consistent with past research (eg, link between accreditation and quality improvement), others were not (eg, job satisfaction). Several self-reported skill gaps were unanticipated, given accreditation's emphasis on training. Potentially, as staff are exposed to accreditation topics, they gain more appreciation of skills development needs. Findings suggest opportunities to strengthen workforce development components when revising accreditation measures

Exploring employer behaviour in relation to Investors in People

"This report explores employer behaviour in relation to choices they make about Investors in People (IIP) accreditation in order for the future IIP strategy to ensure IIP is relevant, adds value to employers and tackles any barriers to successful delivery. The research focuses on the decision-making processes and experiences of three key groups of employers: employers that have held IIP accreditation for a number of years; employers who previously held IIP accreditation but have let this lapse; and employers who committed to gaining IIP accreditation but subsequently did not to go through the assessment process" - page 1

Accreditation of health services: is it money and time well spent?

The research evidence shows that accreditation is a useful tool for stimulating improvements in the quality and safety of health services. Accreditation programs are deployed widely to monitor and promote safety and quality in healthcare. Governments, health service organisations and accreditation agencies have invested considerable resources into accreditation programs, but to date evidence of their effectiveness is limited and varied in some areas. Without more robust evidence – on what aspects of accreditation programs work, in what contexts and why – policymakers will have to continue drawing on expert opinion, small-scale program evaluations and cautious comparative assessments of the literature when reviewing, revising or implementing  accreditation programs

Accreditation and related regulatory matters in the UK

About the book: This volume presents a rich account of the development of accreditation and evaluation in 20 European countries. The authors are leaders in the field and they have cooperated in this effort by writing richly different, often deep and insightful analyses of the situation in their country. The two editors have added a synopsis detailing the main trends, and sketching commonalities as well as contrasts in the developments across Europe. The book shows how accreditation is becoming a main mechanism in the steering of higher education all over Europe. The book is unique in its analysis of forces driving towards the spread of different models of accreditation in the emerging European Higher Education area. Readers will obtain an up-to-date picture of the state of affairs of accreditation in the framework of evaluation activities in Europe. They will gain an understanding of why accreditation and evaluation systems have evolved the way they have, and subsequently, they will obtain more realistic views on potentialities for European comparability and cooperation in this area. This volume is of interest to researchers and policy-making staff in higher education, especially those involved at the level of national systems for quality assurance, accreditation, internationalization and the Bologna process. It is also of interest to Master/PhD students in (higher) education management