The U.S. Education Department (ED) on Monday announced its long-anticipated negotiated rulemaking to reform the accreditation system, which ultimately will result in new regulations.
The department’s announcement comes in light of a high-profile executive order and numerous official statements by the Trump administration that reflect a deep dissatisfaction with the accreditation status quo. Recently, the administration has also proposed modifying the federal handbook that guides the agency process. The American Association of Community Colleges (AACC) has submitted comments on those proposals, along with the American Council on Education and other associations.
The Higher Education Act (HEA) tightly circumscribes ED’s role in recognizing accreditation agencies for the purposes of Title IV. Among other things, the department is formally prohibited from issuing any regulations related to student achievement, the first and putatively most important of the 10 standards in the HEA statute that guide ED’s recognition of institutional accrediting agencies. Nevertheless, the first Trump administration modified important aspects of accrediting regulations (reaching consensus in ‘neg reg’) and the last two Democratic administrations were active in this area as well.
The new negotiated rulemaking committee, to be called the Accreditation, Innovation and Modernization (AIM) Committee, will meet for two one-week sessions in April and May. The committee’s charge is far-reaching and reflects a strong interest in modifying key aspects of the accreditation process.
In announcing the new effort, ED Under Secretary Nicholas Kent stated that “Rather than focusing on whether member institutions offer high-quality programs that benefit students and the workforce, the current accreditation regime has become a protectionist system that shields existing players, fuels rising costs, drives credential inflation, adds administrative bloat, allows undue influence from related trade associations, and promotes ideologically driven initiatives. We welcome nominations from key stakeholders willing to challenge the status quo to help reform this unhealthy system.”
ED priorities
The department’s further objectives are spelled out in the announcement:
- Deregulation: ED will address regulations that impede the entry of new accreditors, reduce burdensome and duplicative requirements that hinder efficient reviews, and require accrediting agencies to enforce their standards in ways that minimize unnecessary costs and administrative burden on institutions.
- Student Outcomes: The department intends to amend its regulations to establish expectations that accrediting agencies assess quality using data-driven student outcomes, rather than unlawful DEI-based standards.
- Merit: ED intends to revise regulations to ensure that accreditors’ standards comply with all federal civil rights laws and prohibit standards or policies that require or facilitate discrimination on the basis of immutable characteristics, such as race-based scholarships.
- Integrity: The department will ensure that accrediting agencies and institutions do not mislead students or the public with misrepresentative labels, such as “regional accreditor”; strengthen requirements to maintain greater separation between accrediting agencies and related trade associations; and improve college affordability by reforming transfer-of-credit policies that force students to unnecessarily repeat coursework and incur additional debt.
Combined reps again
AACC intends to nominate negotiators for the seat that represents public institutions. The association strenuously objects to the administration’s recent action to eliminate a dedicated spot for community college representatives in negotiated-rulemaking tables, breaking decades-long precedent.
Instead, the two- and four-year public sectors of higher education, which collectively educate three-quarters of all postsecondary undergraduates, have been assigned a consolidated seat. In contrast, a variety of other stakeholders who appear to be less directly and indirectly impacted by accreditation changes have been given a dedicated seat.
AACC will keep its members informed about developments in this area.
