How the Education Dept. Is Proposing to Ease Rules on Accreditation

Chronicle photo by Julia Schmalz

The U.S. Department of Education took a step toward making significant changes in the federal regulation of accreditation on Tuesday, proposing to give accreditors more flexibility in approving new kinds of academic programs and allow troubled colleges more time to meet accreditation standards.

The proposed rules, detailed over 413 pages, are meant to ease the process for accreditors to earn federal recognition — a requirement to serve as a gatekeeper for federal financial aid — as well as to allow new accreditors to gain that status.

The new regulations would also allow the department more flexibility in continuing recognition for accreditors that are not in compliance with federal regulations.

The department announced on Tuesday that it planned to publish the proposed final rules this week to carry out changes agreed to this year in a round of negotiated rulemaking. After the regulations are published in the Federal Register, the public will have 30 days to comment, and the department will consider the comments. If the final approved rules are published by November 1, they would go into effect in July 2020.

In explaining the changes, the department repeated its argument that existing federal rules have made accreditation a burden that stifles innovation and encourages uniformity among institutions.

“With these reforms, our nation’s colleges and universities can spend more time and effort on serving students and less time, energy, and money focused on bureaucratic compliance,” the education secretary, Betsy DeVos, said in a news release.

Some of the changes are necessary to give accreditors more leeway, said Deborah Seymour, an independent consultant in higher education who has worked at public universities and for-profit colleges. Accreditors have become reluctant to approve innovations, she said, because of warnings from the department’s inspector general.

But advocates for students and consumer-protection groups have criticized the regulations as a sellout to institutions and accreditors in a system in which few colleges are penalized by the accreditors that are meant to oversee them.

“The justifications here confirm that the department’s goal here is to give both institutions and accreditors the benefit of the doubt at every turn,” Antoinette Flores, associate director for postsecondary education at the Center for American Progress, a think tank, said in an email. “It will be extremely difficult to hold either party accountable for failing.”

Easier Approval of Academic Changes

Among the biggest changes proposed in the new regulations is in the ability of accreditors to streamline approvals of “substantive changes,” such as new academic programs, that are “a significant departure from existing offerings or methods of delivery.”

The department is proposing that the accreditor’s senior staff members be allowed to approve some of those changes at institutions that are in good standing, rather than requiring all such changes to be approved by the accreditor’s governing board. The change is meant to speed up approval of those programs so that institutions can better respond to work-force needs.

Accreditors would also get more latitude to modify their standards for curricula and faculty qualifications for programs that are meant to prepare students for a specific industry or licensing requirement.

Other big changes include how accreditors and the Education Department handle troubled and failing institutions.

Under the current rules, a college has two years to come into compliance with accreditation standards before an accreditor must act to remove accreditation. The proposed rule would allow that period of noncompliance to last as long as four years.

In addition, if a college is closing, the proposed regulations would allow it to continue receiving federal financial aid for up to 120 days.

At the same time, the new regulations would add requirements for accreditors and struggling colleges to develop “teach-out” plans for their students to complete programs at other institutions, said Karen McCarthy, director of policy analysis at the National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators.

New Recognition Process

The proposed regulations would also change how the federal government oversees accreditors through its recognition process. Under current regulations, accrediting agencies are reviewed by Education Department staff members, and an independent advisory committee recommends to the education secretary whether to recognize the organization.

The new rules would give the department the authority to monitor an accreditor that does not fully meet federal standards. But that process would not be open to public scrutiny, as the advisory-committee meetings and documents are.

Accreditors have long argued for less federal oversight.

Accreditation advocates gave the department’s proposals mixed grades.

“There are a number of things that we like in these proposed regulations,” Judith Eaton, president of the Council for Higher Education Accreditation, said in a written statement. The council, a membership organization of some 3,000 accredited colleges, recognizes about 60 accrediting agencies.

The council favors the new requirements for teach-out plans and a proposed rule that would force colleges and accreditors to seek arbitration in any dispute before either party could file a lawsuit. Colleges nearly always file such suits after accreditors move to reject their accreditation, drawing out the process for years and putting a financial strain on the accreditor.

But Eaton said the council “has questions” about the proposal to allow accreditors to grant accreditation retroactively and increase the amount of time that colleges can come into compliance with federal regulations.

Eric Kelderman writes about money and accountability in higher education, including such areas as state policy, accreditation, and legal affairs. You can find him on Twitter @etkeld, or email him at eric.kelderman@chronicle.com.