Regional accreditation standards

The impetus for outcomes assessment has come more recently from accrediting agencies.  All regional accrediting bodies, such as North Central, Middle States, or Southern Associations of Colleges and Schools, and professional accrediting bodies including ASHA, receive their authority by approval of the Council for Higher Education Accreditation (CHEA), which assumed this function from the Council on Recognition of Postsecondary Accreditation (CORPA) in 1996.   The inclusion of outcomes assessment as part of accreditation by any of these bodies is mandated by the CHEA, and thus is a requirement for all regional as well as professional accreditation.  This means that applications for accreditation must demonstrate that institutions or programs have plans for assessing educational outcomes, and can show evidence that the results of these assessments have led to improvement of teaching and learning and, ultimately, better preparation for entering the professions.  Accrediting bodies have thus revised, or are revising standards for accreditation that move away from “input” models involving prescribed courses and/or number of clinical hours in specific areas to examination of “output” that students can demonstrate. 

This text adapted from:

Hallowell, B. & Lund, N. (1998).  Fostering program improvements through a focus on educational outcomes.  In Council of Graduate Programs in Communication Sciences and Disorders, Proceedings of the twenty-first annual conference on graduate education, 32-56.

Last modified: 08/01/03