Accreditation
Until this morning, I did not know that the accreditation of degree granting schools in the USA is performed by private peer review councils. In most other major countries, the government is in charge of accreditation.
The present situation with accreditation policies and procedures in the USA got its start after WWII, when the GI Bill put a lot of money up for grabs to support post secondary and vocational education for the veterans. As you can imagine, there were opportunists eager to cash in. It is almost a given that when a government makes a bold financial gesture, there will be corruption and fraud.
With all the dubious schools trying to cash in on the GI funding, some oversight and control was needed. The government chose to put this in the hands of the private sector.
The present educational landscape includes accredited schools in good standing, schools that have had their accreditation removed by the granting body, and schools that never seek accreditation. Many religious schools do not seek accreditation. Operating a non-accredited school is not fraud. Using a degree from a non-accredited school to obtain employment under false pretenses is a crime in many states. Some states have special laws that allow them to shut down what are commonly called ‘diploma mills’.
I should disclose the fact that I used Wikipedia as a resource for this post. Wikipedia is not an accredited university.
