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In the United States, accreditation is a non-governmental, peer review process that ensures educational quality. Educational institutions or programs volunteer to periodically undergo this review in order to determine if certain criteria are being met. It is important to understand, however, that accreditation is not a ranking system. It is simply assurance that a program or institution meets established quality standards.
There are two types of accreditation: institutional and specialized.
In the United States, ABET, Inc., is responsible for the specialized accreditation of educational programs in applied science, computing, engineering, and technology.
More general information about accreditation is available at www.chea.org.
The quality standards programs must meet to be ABET-accredited are set by the ABET professions themselves. This is made possible by the collaborative efforts of many different professional and technical societies. These societies and their members work together through ABET to develop the standards, and they provide the professionals who evaluate the programs to make sure they meet those standards.
Accreditation is a voluntary process on the part of an institution. The first step is that an institution requests an evaluation of its program(s). (Only programs that have produced at least one graduate are eligible for accreditation.) Each program then conducts an internal evaluation and completes a self-study questionnaire. The self-study documents whether students, curriculum, faculty, administration, facilities, and institutional support meet the established criteria.
While the program conducts its self-examination, the appropriate ABET commission (Applied Science, Computing, Engineering, or Technology Commission) forms an evaluation team to visit the campus. A team chair and one or more program evaluators make up the evaluation team. Team members are volunteers from academe, government, and industry, as well as private practice.
During the on-campus visit, the evaluation team reviews course materials, student projects, and sample assignments and interviews students, faculty, and administrators. The team investigates whether the criteria are met and tackles any questions raised by the self-study.
Following its campus visit, the team provides the school with a written report of the evaluation. This allows the program to correct any misrepresentations or errors of fact, as well as address any shortcomings in a timely manner.
At a large annual meeting of all ABET commission members, the final evaluation report is presented by the evaluation team, along with its recommended accreditation action. Based on the findings of the report, the commission members vote on the action, and the school is notified of the decision. The information the school receives identifies strengths, concerns, weaknesses, deficiencies, and recommendations for improvements. Accreditation is granted for a maximum of six years. To renew accreditation, the institution must request another evaluation.
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