13 State Attorneys General Say Accreditor’s Recognition Should Be Revoked

Thirteen state attorneys general have asked that federal recognition not be renewed for the Accrediting Council for Independent Colleges and Schools, the much-maligned accreditor of, for one, the now-defunct Corinthian Colleges. The request was made in a letter on Friday to the heads of the U.S. Education Department and the National Advisory Committee on Institutional Quality and Integrity, known as Naciqi.

“Even in the crowded field of accrediting failures,” the officials wrote, “ACICS deserves special opprobrium.” Among other problems, the letter states, institutions accredited by the council have dismal graduation rates and low loan-repayment rates, and have not been effectively overseen by it.

The agency’s most “spectacular failure,” the attorneys general wrote, was its accreditation of the for-profit Corinthian Colleges chain, which collapsed under extra federal scrutiny in 2014.

In a statement, the council said that it had not received the comments that the attorneys general had made to Naciqi, but that it “looks forward to reviewing all public comments and defending its merits” before the committee.