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If you, after the Hokusai-like tsunami of higher education policy changes in 2025, were as exhausted as everyone else, you may have missed the Trump administration’s Dec. 11 request for information to receive feedback on planned changes to the Department of Education’s Accreditation Handbook. This was the first step in a longer process of updating the handbook “so that the process for the Department’s recognition of an accrediting agency is transparent, efficient, and not unduly burdensome.” From my little boat under the great wave, I hope that public engagement in accreditation, in the form of student outcome measures and public accreditation reports, can be strengthened in this process.
The department’s request for information references President Trump’s Executive Order 14279, “Reforming Accreditation to Strengthen Higher Education.” The order highlights the nation’s low average graduation rate, rightly calling out the harm that low-quality institutions and programs can cause to students. Students deserve better than a 64 percent chance of graduating within six years, and there is much policymakers can do to help them.
Instead, the administration chose to focus on removing diversity, equity and inclusion from quality-assurance processes. Dismantling systems to support historically marginalized populations, as the executive order calls for, is far more likely to harm graduation rates than improve them. New research shows that graduation is linked to students’ sense of belonging on campus. DEI programs and offices help foster that sense of belonging—or at least they did until they came under attack in 2023.
Another way to ensure that students are supported is to increase the transparency and comparability of quality assurance. If the administration really wants to increase student outcomes, the Accreditation Handbook should prioritize quantitative outcome measures. Currently, accreditors are required to assess student achievement, but quantitative standards are suggested, not mandatory. Section 602.16(a)(1)(i) directs the accreditor to assess “success with respect to student achievement in relation to the institution’s mission … including, as appropriate, consideration of state licensing examinations, course completion, and job placement rates.”
Accreditors must also demonstrate that they examine institutions’ student loan default rates, per Section 602.16(a)(1)(x). These measures can help provide a picture of student success, and they should be expanded to include persistence, graduation and loan repayment rates. Accreditors should be required to assess multiple quantitative student outcome measures, with the addition of qualitative measures as needed. These measures should be made public so that students and families can examine and use them as well.
The good news is that this change would not meaningfully increase institutions’ workload. Through the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System and the College Scorecard, institutions already publicize student outcomes data. Some accreditors, like the WASC Senior College and University Commission, also highlight federal retention and postgraduation outcome data on their websites. Tying these measures into the Accreditation Handbook simply reinforces the value of quantitative data in the quality assurance process. It also signals the importance of making some information standard and comparable across all institutions.
The reasoning behind accreditation decisions should be made public as well, by requiring accreditors to publish site visit reports and decision letters online. Currently, the Accreditation Handbook requires accreditors to include members of the public in all its decision-making bodies [Section 602.15(a)(5)], but the public at large is not informed about the rationale for decisions.
The international best practice is to publish expert reviewers’ accreditation reports in full—see page 20 of the Standards and Guidelines for Quality Assurance in the European Higher Education Area—giving the public insight into the institution’s activities and accreditors’ recommendations for improvement. Accreditation reports are available to the public in Canada, the United Kingdom and Japan. Proposed updates to the European Standards and Guidelines would also require accreditors to publish the supporting documentation used to make the decisions (see page 15).
We know that public trust in higher education is decreasing rapidly, and providing accessible information is a powerful way to repair this trust. The goal of this change is not to put more information online; rather, it is to use information to create stronger connections with stakeholders, including students, faculty, staff and local communities. This change allows the public to follow up on recommendations for improvement while highlighting institutions’ commitments to ongoing quality assurance.
In Kosovo, where I am, stakeholders monitor accreditors’ decision-making meetings and use accreditation reports to track trends in the higher education system. This change also enables public oversight of accreditors themselves. In other countries where site visit reports and accreditation decisions are published, some accreditors involve external stakeholders in reviewing them for consistency across institutions.
Continuous improvement is necessary on campus and in federal policies. The planned revisions to the Accreditation Handbook are an opportunity to push for clearer standards and evidence-based decisions about what makes for a high-quality higher education system.
