With countless online university offers fighting for your
attention online, one of your first priorities in finding a
university is to verify its credentials. Accreditation can make
all the difference in the quality of the education being
offered. It isn't enough that a university is accredited. Find
out more details about the accreditation. It should be
legitimate and have recognition from the US Department of
Education or the Council for Higher Accreditation.
What Is Accreditation
The US Department of Education has identified key points in
ensuring the accreditation of an online university. Firstly, the
institution needs to be able to meet established standards. They
should also offer assistance to students in identifying the
right colleges and finding out the details of transfer credits.
The college should have set goals for self-improvement and
increasing educational standards. Faculty and staff needs to be
involved in institutional evaluation and planning. Criteria
should be in place for availing federal financial assistance.
Accreditation is defined as a voluntary, non-governmental
process of peer review by which an institution meets specific
standards. However in layman's language, it is more practical to
think of it as the difference between a degree and the job that
you've been striving for, and a waste of time, energy and money
into a course that will eventually prove worthless.
Today's employers are already pressed for time. This means they
can spare very little of it in verifying the qualifications of a
potential candidate. Therefore they find it much simpler and
more practical to only consider applicants qualifying from an
accredited institution whose standards they deem acceptable.
Types of Accreditation
Accreditation of a college can itself be of two types,
institutional and specialized accreditation. The former applies
to the institution as a whole to ensure that it is able to
conform to certain set standards. In specialized accreditation,
it is only a particular program that is involved for being able
to meet specific industry standards.
Institutional accreditation is again of two types, national and
regional. National accreditation transfer credits are not easily
accepted by colleges and universities as it implies inability to
meet criteria for regional accreditation. National accreditation
is primarily limited to institutes that prepare students to join
the workforce at the earliest. They include religious schools,
technical institutes, vocational and correspondence schools.
On the other hand regional accreditation is recognized not just
by the US Department of Education but is also considered the
standard for other colleges and universities. Transferring
college credits becomes a lot easier as the college meets the
necessary standards with a combination of theory and practical
experience. In certain cases like engineering, law, medicine,
science and teaching, the degree needs to be both
institutionalized and specialized in accreditation.
About the author:
Jean Chortillion enjoys writing about online education. For more
information, see a review of how to find an
accredited online university.
