AICU to SACS: Blow it out!

[Martin Eisenstadt]

After being put on probation for two years by SACS, American InterContinental University regained their SACS accreditation in December, 2007.  They promptly turned around and applied for accreditation by NCACS.  AICU announced yesterday that now it has been granted accreditation by NCACS.

American InterContinental University Granted Accreditation by the Higher Learning Commission of the North Central Association

AIU, which has been accredited by the Commission on Colleges of the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools (SACS) since 1987, chose to seek HLC accreditation in order to better reflect the fact that the majority of its students are served through its Internet-based campus which is based in the HLC geographic region.

SACS seems to be downright hostile to online programs, and since the "majority" of AICU's students are doing online programs, it's not surprising they ran into trouble.  Time for SACS to get in touch with the 21st Century.  Wasn't it Tennessee's Al Gore who claimed he invented the internet?  Somebody needs to let those SACS dirt clods in on the news.

[Albert Hidel]

SACS seems to be downright hostile to online programs, and since the "majority" of AICU's students are doing online programs, it's not surprising they ran into trouble.  Time for SACS to get in touch with the 21st Century.  Wasn't it Tennessee's Al Gore who claimed he invented the internet?  Somebody needs to let those SACS dirt clods in on the news.

You are right about the backward approach SACS takes to online schools.  They drove APU/AMU out of Virginia too.

But that's only half the story as far as AICU is concerned.  Like the good socialists they are, SACS also hates for-profits.  The Obamunist Regime wants to "spread the wealth around," which makes AICU's parent Career Education Corp. a ripe target for redistributionists and statists.

Also note that despite the controversy CEC's enrollments are up for 2009 over last year:

  

      
                                                   As of April 30,    
                                        2009              2008              % Change        
STUDENT POPULATION:
                
University
                
AIU
Online                              18,300           16,900              8  %  
On-ground                          3,600             3,500             3  %  

CTU
Online                              20,100            17,000           18  %  
On-ground                          5,000             4,300           16  %

http://yahoo.brand.edgar-online.com/disp...-09-101557

The economy might be down but AIU and CTU are still bringing in students.  The wealthy SACS cartel members were probably having trouble competing against leaner, meaner private companies, so they called out the dogs to do their dirty work for them.  Smart move by CEC to bail themselves out rather than waiting for the Obamunistas to sink them.

[Armando Ramos]

The Obamunist Regime wants to "spread the wealth around," which makes AICU's parent Career Education Corp. a ripe target for redistributionists and statists.

The latest chapter of the AICU Travelin' Uni saga:  the Obamunists are now taking shots at NCACS for accrediting AICU.  The clear message to accreditors is: don't accredit for-profits, at least not until we've had a chance to shake them down first.  This has all the earmarks of a Rahm Emanuel-style dead fish.

And this socialist nutjob Lederman once again shows what a complete vacuum of the brainpan he operates with.  Bush just wanted accreditation agencies to actually stand for what people suppose they stand for, i.e., insuring quality education, and which, not surprisingly, the cartel resisted.   On the other hand, as has been noted, Dear Leader is merely nationalizing another segment of the economy.

Scrutiny for an Accreditor

December 18, 2009

And people thought the Bush administration was tough on accreditors.

Fresh off reviews of the policies of two other regional accrediting groups, the Education Department's inspector general issued a stinging rebuke Thursday of the country's largest regional accreditor and urged department officials to consider terminating the agency's authority.

The inspector general essentially accused the Higher Learning Commission of the North Central Association of Colleges and Schools of shirking its federal gate keeping duties because it granted accreditation to a for-profit university despite a single flaw that the inspector general deemed to be serious.

The agency's action stunned many higher education leaders, who characterized it as a misstep of dramatic proportions. "We believe that the OIG's recommendation is an unwarranted overreaction," Sylvia Manning, president of the Higher Learning Commission, said in a news release. "To make a sweeping indictment of the HLC's capacity to judge quality based on a single case or even a small group of cases is wrongheaded and overreaching."

"It's like saying, there's a problem in the horn section of the New York Philharmonic, and we want you to shut down the whole orchestra as a result," said Terry W. Hartle, senior vice president for government and public affairs at the American Council on Education.

Added Belle S. Wheelan, president of the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools and head of the Council of Regional Accreditation Commissions: "This is certainly of concern, because they appear to have put themselves in the place of the evaluators, and made a recommendation that's fairly radical based on one instance at one institution."

The Education Department under the previous secretary, Margaret Spellings, was highly critical of accreditation, and it undertook several efforts -- both to change federal rules governing the system of institutional peer review and to toughen its oversight of accreditors -- that ultimately ran into a brick wall on Capitol Hill.

But the Obama administration, in the presence of Education Secretary Arne Duncan, has shown no signs of backing off. While last winter's negotiations over new rules governing accreditation ended in far more accord than did the 2007 discussion that blew up in conflict, the end result left some accreditation experts believing that the federal government was continuing to expand its reach and authority into accreditation matters.

The inspector general, which investigates potential misuse of Education Department funds and operates independently of the agency's political leaders and policy makers, began its own review of how three major regional accrediting groups define "credit hours" as they judge the academic quality and rigor of the institutions they accredit. In recent weeks, the IG's office issued audits that raised varying levels of concern about the policies at the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools and the Middle States Commission on Higher Education.

In its examination of the policies at the Higher Learning Commission, though, the inspector general came across what the unusual "alert memorandum" it issued Thursday calls a "serious issue" requiring the "immediate attention" of department officials. The IG took issue with the Higher Learning Commission's decision to grant full accreditation last summer to American InterContinental University (part of Career Education Corp.) "with no limitations on the programs it offered at the time of initial accreditation," despite finding "issues related to AIU's assignment of credit hours to certain undergraduate and graduate programs."

"HLC's accreditation of AIU calls into question whether it is a reliable authority regarding the quality of education or training provided by the institution. Since HLC determined that the practices at AIU meet its standards for quality, without limitation, the Department should be concerned about the quality of education or training at other institutions accredited by HLC," the IG's memo said.

It recommended that the department's Office of Postsecondary Education review the accreditor's actions for possible violations and, if it finds them, act to "limit, suspend or terminate HLC's recognition by the secretary" -- the harshest possible penalty available to the department.

Such action, if taken, could impair the ability of the many hundreds of colleges that the commission accredits to award federal financial aid.

The Accreditor's View

Exactly what issues that the Higher Learning Commission found (and that the inspector general accuses it of underemphasizing) is impossible to tell from the heavily redacted eight-page memo that the inspector general published, about half of which is blacked out. According to Manning, the accreditor's president, though, "what the HLC found was a concern that a disproportionate amount of credit was being awarded for certain courses," notably those that involve significant work outside the classroom.

That potential problem was "egregious," Manning acknowledged -- while also pointing out that the Higher Learning Commission did take actions against American InterContinental, as the inspector general quietly notes in a footnote. "HLC did require that a focused visit on the issue of credit equivalence at AIU be scheduled for the academic year 2010-11. HLC has also required AIU to obtain prior approval before initiating any new degree programs, any new degree sites, or any new distance degree programs," the footnote said. (AIU had previously been accredited by the Southern association, and while the university had had its troubles with that accreditor, it was in good standing at the point in 2007 when it sought approval from HLC.)

With those limitations in place, Higher Learning Commission officials made the considered judgment that the single flaw, significant as it was, was not enough to warrant withholding overall accreditation from AIU, Manning said. "We said, 'You need to fix this, but we'll still accredit you.' "

That decision, Manning said, was an "academic judgment," and what so perturbs her, and concerns other accreditors, is that the inspector general's office is, Manning said, substituting its own judgment in place of the accreditor's.

"They're saying, 'You thought it was okay to accredit them, and we don't,' " Manning said.

Judith S. Eaton, president of the Council for Higher Education Accreditation, which represents colleges on accreditation issues, agreed. "Here you have a judgment by an accrediting commission that there is a problem, and an action taken such that the institution is to correct the problem. On that basis, why the alert?"

Eaton characterized the inspector general's memo as part of a worrisome trend -- beginning with the Spellings Commission but showing no signs of abating -- of increased federal involvement in matters to which the government has traditionally granted more latitude. The regulatory language approved by the federal negotiating team last winter "created a situation, we thought, where the department could go into an accreditor at any time and raise any number of issues," Eaton said.

"Of course there has to be accountability, but we were worried about the balance" of authority. "We thought it provided a platform for ongoing scrutiny of the actions of an accrediting organization" -- concerns that the inspector general's actions against the Higher Learning Commission reinforce, she said.

An Education Department spokeswoman said that, as is typically the case, the inspector general's office would have no further comment on its alert. The spokeswoman distributed some information about the situation noting that the education secretary cannot take any action against the commission until her accreditation advisory committee -- which was disbanded by Congress in 2008 and has not yet been fully reconstituted -- has a chance to review the situation.

Until then, the department points out, "the more than one thousand colleges and universities accredited by HLC are not in any immediate danger of losing federal aid eligibility as a result of the OIG findings regarding the agency."

Oh, one other thing, the department adds: "When an accrediting agency loses federal recognition, institutions have at least 18 months to pursue accreditation by a different agency."

— Doug Lederman

[Ben Johnson]

Accreditation will be the least of worries after Obama welcomes one world government and all your tax dollars are sent to Africa and Asia because you are all evil white men who pollute the world and deserve to be taxed back to the stone age.

[ham]

Let alone former junk fascist countries in Europe, now junk democratic countries, look at Canada...Quebec for example enforces severe curricula and little room is left, if any, for any 'special' or 'confessional' idea except big brother's party line.

Whose fault is it?
Surprisingly, it is damn f-cking, unwashed little hulkamaniacs' fault...and I can prove it.
Who brought big brother first into matters of school curricula? Those who fought either for or against creationism or evolutionism being taught in school.
It does not really matter whether Christian bigots won once and communist social alchemists won twice, or the other way round: they set a precedent squealing for big brother to intervene.
I remember a fable about frogs whose pond was drying up...they though they were smart when they asked a seagull to help them cross over to a nearby lake.
Guess what...the seagull ate all of them.
The story continues with a big, old crab who suspected the truth and was prepared, so when the seagull was ready to kill him, he strangled it with his big claws.

The lesson is: you can't complain when big brother says you're wrong, if you summoned him and rejoiced when it said you were right...and ultimately, big brother answers to none but the results of instant polls changing every hour and to the lash of the powerful carpet baggers and bankrollers who finance the sordid clique of the day.

Now they are all bellyaching that big brother grows too fast...like a cancer...but they would the first to salute it in case of another court case about creationism vs evolutionism.

Accreditation will be the least of worries after Obama welcomes one world government and all your tax dollars are sent to Africa and Asia because you are all evil white men who pollute the world and deserve to be taxed back to the stone age.

They do not care about Africa or Asia...didn't you read that UN organization supposed to solve the problems of starvation hog 75-80% of all funds themselves?
White social alchemists and a bunch of people of color dressed up like Christmas trees make speeches and wash them down with foie gras, beluga caviar, quail eggs, champagne reserve and dwarf shrimps cocktails...in the end they speed in their limousines disseminating flyers that expose pollution, energy waste and global warming...
We know where the money is going...either to some third world thug who'll buy arms...or to some nice 'research centre' for studies, more studies and peer review of the same...or to some quack who invented a new anti-pollution filter and whose company sponsors the usual bunch of political parasites.

[Dennis Ruhl]

Accreditation will be the least of worries after Obama welcomes one world government and all your tax dollars are sent to Africa and Asia because you are all evil white men who pollute the world and deserve to be taxed back to the stone age.

Maybe we could follow the Russians or Chinese who systematically eliminated their economic criminals by killing about 20% of the population. It seems some of the worst criminals were ethnic minorities.

I would definitely worry about the Obama government when it comes to accreditation. As with all Marxist-Leninists, the perception has more value than the reality. The North Central Association could be sacrificed to prove what a good job Obama is doing in education. The alternative of actually improving education is irrelevent and unworkable.

[Little Arminius]

They do not care about Africa or Asia...didn't you read that UN organization supposed to solve the problems of starvation hog 75-80% of all funds themselves?

You wouldn't want them to actually waste the money on the target population, would you?

White social alchemists and a bunch of people of color dressed up like Christmas trees make speeches and wash them down with foie gras, beluga caviar, quail eggs, champagne reserve and dwarf shrimps cocktails...in the end they speed in their limousines disseminating flyers that expose pollution, energy waste and global warming...
We know where the money is going...either to some third world thug who'll buy arms...or to some nice 'research centre' for studies, more studies and peer review of the same...or to some quack who invented a new anti-pollution filter and whose company sponsors the usual bunch of political parasites.

As much as such a vision sickens us, the taxpaying public, I bet that it sounds fine to some tool of the cartel like George Gollin. Hell, he probably aspires to enter the highest levels of just such a class of people, all of whom have one thing in common ... they have made a career of self-serving "public service" without ever having actually produced anything of value.

To borrow a phrase from ham, ... PFFT!!!

[Armando Ramos]

Another uni tells SACS to blow it out. This time it's historically black Paul Quinn College in Dallas. They had their SACS accreditation revoked in 2009, so they just jumped over to TRACS, where they now have been granted full accreditation. Looks like we can add HBCU's to the list of non-conforming establishments that SACS wants to run out of town. The "Quinnite Nation" just told SACS what to do with that.

PQC EARNS TRACS ACCREDITATION

The Transnational Association of Christian Colleges and Schools, also known as TRACS, has awarded Paul Quinn College full accreditation. TRACS is a voluntary, non-profit, self-governing organization that provides accreditation to faith-based institutions offering associate, baccalaureate, and graduate degress. The organization is recognized by the United States Department of Education and the Council for Higher Education Accreditation.

Check out the coverage of this great news in HBCU Digest, Dallas South News and in the Metro section and on the editorial blog of The Dallas Morning News.