By Eric Kelderman,mThe Chronicle of Higher Efucation, April 10, 2015

Every reauthorization of the Higher Education Act seems to revive criticisms of the nation’s accreditation system as well as proposals to make major changes in how it works.

So far the process has survived because lawmakers have been unable to figure out how to overhaul accreditation without increasing the federal government’s role in regulating higher education.

This time could be different, say some experts on accreditation. A white paper released last month by the staff of the U.S. Senate’s education committee proposes far-reaching changes in accreditation, including the possibility of “decoupling” it as a requirement for participating in federal student-aid programs. A college must be accredited by a federally recognized accreditor to be eligible for that money.

Sen. Lamar Alexander, a Tennessee Republican and the committee’s chairman, will take a lead role in writing the next reauthorization of the Higher Education Act. The paper was one of three that his staff released to start a discussion on that legislation.

The idea of removing accreditors as “gatekeepers” of federal student aid has been discussed in the past, says Judith S. Eaton, president of the Council for Higher Education Accreditation, but never so openly.

“I don’t recall gatekeeping being put on the table flat out,” she said in an interview with The Chronicle.

But one result of reducing the role of accreditors could be a major increase in federal regulation or a significant decline in safeguards of federal student aid. “The big concern,” Ms. Eaton said, “is if you take away gatekeeping, what next?”

Dissatisfaction

What’s next for accreditation depends a lot on what you think is wrong with the current system.

David A. Bergeron, a former acting assistant secretary for postsecondary education, says that in the past he was not in favor of decoupling accreditation from federal student aid.

“But I really have come to think that in an era of big data and alternative ways to think about performance outcomes, decoupling becomes more of an option,” said Mr. Bergeron, who is now vice president for postsecondary education at the Center for American Progress.

The current accreditation system is more concerned with preserving the status quo and does not do enough to improve outcomes for students, Mr. Bergeron said.

“The institutions sanctioned ­aren’t always the worst-performing ones,” he said. “They get sanctioned about finances, not about outcomes.”

He added, “The system is not driving change the way we would like it or at the pace we would like it.”

One solution, Mr. Bergeron said, is to use something like the proposed federal college-rating system to determine whether institutions are eligible for federal student aid, setting requirements for measures such as access, affordability, graduation and retention, and employment outcomes.

That proposal isn’t likely to go far in a Republican-controlled Congress, where President Obama’s proposed rating system remains unpopular. Colleges, too, have largely rejected such a system as unfair and too narrow a gauge of their value and performance.

But the paper from Senator Alexander’s office does propose stripping the current accreditation system of requirements not directly related to academic quality, such as those concerning facilities maintenance and compliance with fire-safety codes.

New Paths

For Andrew P. Kelly, a resident scholar on education policy at the American Enterprise Institute, the biggest problem with accreditation is that it inhibits innovation, from both institutions and accreditors.

Traditional accreditation is hard to get, especially from one of the nation’s six regional accreditors, because it can take several years, and a college must graduate at least one class of students before being fully accredited.

That is a big and expensive barrier to a new institution. And the current accreditation model doesn’t work at all with companies, such as StraighterLine and Coursera, that provide courses rather than degrees.

Instead of trashing the whole accreditation system, though, Mr. Kelly favors creating a process to allow an alternative set of accreditors and more flexibility in the process. Traditional accreditation groups could continue to exist for the colleges that choose them, Mr. Kelly said.

Creating an alternative accreditation track without dismantling the traditional process would simplify the politics for conservative groups that have been critical of accreditation but “don’t want to put more power into the hands of the federal government,” he said.

And this is what the Alexander paper proposes, offering three possible structures: Allowing existing accreditors to create alternative paths to accreditation for new institutions or course providers; allowing states to create new accrediting bodies or to designate other groups to act as accreditors; or using federal grants to create entirely new accrediting agencies.

That approach would not cure all of accreditation’s problems, Mr. Kelly said, especially the slow pace at which accreditors move to revoke their approval of even the most troubled institutions. While accreditors can place an institution on “warning” or “probation,” the only significant penalty they can wield is to remove a college’s accreditation, which they rarely do.

The paper proposes “gradations” in accreditation status that would provide more information on the overall quality of a college, compared with other institutions.

For accreditors, the suggested alternatives could preserve their status as gatekeepers for federal financial aid. But they leave difficult questions about what measures could be used to both ensure quality and protect the federal investment, said Ms. Eaton, of the Council for Higher Education Accreditation. She asked, “How do we create an accreditation process that is not traditional and not a checklist but still effective?”

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 [email protected].