What Should Students Know About Accreditation?

There are tons of considerations that a young college hopeful needs to take into account. You cannot select a college from the degree program to tuition fee unless you are well-informed whether that college is where you belong. One of the many considerations in the process is accreditation. If you are serious about your higher education and want to avoid hassles in the future genuinely, then you must find out whether that particular college is accredited. Why? Well, you should read along to know the answer.
In this article, I shall be covering a fundamental aspect of quality education worldwide. Your life may be significantly affected depending on accreditation, and I shall explain to you why such is the case. Here is why students must know about accreditation:

1. What is accreditation in the first place?
   We must start from scratch. What exactly is accreditation? To put it simply, it is a formal status granted to an educational institution that indicates the maintenance of high-quality education standards. The entire accreditation process involves the evaluation of the institution’s overall academic framework based on its curriculum, facilities for people with special needs, research output, student-teacher ratio, etc. Once an institution gets accredited, the public is made aware that the said institution is authentic, resourceful, and able to provide a promising future for its students.

2. Who does the accreditation?
   This answer may vary from one country to another. Generally speaking, there are designated agencies that accredit institutions and operate under the direct control and supervision of the State. For instance, in the United States of America, top-level accreditation is taken up by the US Department of Education and the Council for Higher Education Accreditation (CHEA). There may be additional regional accrediting agencies, such as the Middle States Association of Colleges and Schools, the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools, and the North Central Association of Colleges and Schools. All of these accrediting agencies have specific standards based on which they assess participating colleges and universities.
   Similarly, the United Kingdom has an array of such agencies for higher education. The Higher Education Degree Data check (Hedd) is the country’s official authenticator of degrees and universities. Aside from it, other agencies assess non-degree qualifications, such as the Council for the Curriculum, Examinations &Assessment in Northern Ireland. For private colleges, there is, among many others, the Accreditation Service for International Colleges (ASIC).

3. What are the consequences of studying in an unaccredited institution?
   There are plenty of consequences for those who go on to study in unaccredited institutions. Unaccredited institutions are often barred from receiving federal financial assistance. Their coursework is lax and inconsequential to academic quality, and employers do not recognize many of these universities. They refuse to hire their graduates, international universities across the globe may not acknowledge the degrees obtained from these unaccredited institutions, and questionable administration. Eventually, the student will have to bear the mark of disrepute because unaccredited institutions are seldom up to the mark.

4. On what basis is the accreditation granted?
   As briefly noted earlier, the standards may vary from one agency to another. However, there are a few commonalities among all major accrediting agencies globally. These common standards include financial stability, educational ethics, quality control & checks, admission process, financial aid to students, accessibility to information to students and others, the coursework of the programs, the qualifications of the teachers, teaching methodology, up-gradation of the courses from time to time, and objectives of the program. The idea is to determine whether the institution can impart education to students.

5. A Concluding Note
   If you are part of an ongoing admission process, you must thoroughly study the accrediting status of the institution you applied for. You can find the database on the evaluation conducted and the scores granted to the institution. It may seem like an added task, but you will surely not like it when a prospective employer refuses to offer you a job simply because you have studied at an unrecognized institution. Things only aggravate if you decide to study abroad. So, do the needful and stay vigilant!

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