The federal government’s presence is increasing in areas that traditionally have been the province of the faculty and institutions. I agree with the article, because when we think of accreditation we mostly think of a process that takes place on our campuses.

This thought may not agree with a lot of other people. The government seeking to ensure that federal funds for student grants and loans were spent, they turned to private sector accrediting organizations for reliable judgments about the quality of institutions.The primary way government oversees accreditation is through a process called identification. George Bush administrations first foray into education was the reauthorizing of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act. The effort resulted in the 2002 “No child left behind” legislation with a powerful important on K-12 liability and a federally organized regimen of national testing focused on documenting student success. Faculty members have a long standing love hate relationship with accreditation those ho value accreditation find it useful.

These are the faculty members who often participate in self studies and in the accreditation review of other institutions.

Most recently faculty members already troubled by accreditation have expressed particular unkindness to the demands from creditors for greater evidence of student achievement. In conclusion we need to campaign together for the core values of institutional autonomy, academic freedom, and peer and professional review, making clear to students and society how important these values are to the future success of higher education.Most important, we need faculty members to be part of the leadership for this effort. This decade has seen self regulation through accreditation increasingly restrict by federal oversight, limiting the independent action of accrediting organizations and penetrating the academic work of faculty meme beers and institutions. Academic freedom is linked to shared governance, which turn is essential to institutional autonomy.