Preparing for Accreditation

1. Preparing for Accreditation What CIOs Need to Know

2. Who Are We? • Meridith Randall – ACCJC ALO for 17 years for 3 different colleges; never had a college receive a sanction; has written multiple self-evaluations, midterm reports, and FU reports; has served on 4 teams, most recently Oct. 2013 • Mary Kay Rudolph – Renowned VP at SRJC; service on multiple accreditation teams

3. Internal Organization • How do you mobilize your campus? • Whom do you involve? • What documents do you need? • How will the work get done?

4. Preparing for Accreditation • Preparing for the External Team • Ideally, teams are trained a few weeks ahead of the visit -- in reality, some team members may be added late to replace others • Most teams have a couple of CEOs, a CIO, student services personnel, and should have faculty (but may not)

5. Team Preparation • Materials used to train Team Members • Handouts • Team members must draft a great deal of the report based on the self-evaluation • Recently, the first meeting is on Monday, then interviews begin immediately • Depending on the team, interviews may or may not be coordinated • Team members may or may not follow guidelines of professionalism

6. What Does the Team Expect? • A comfortable room with hard evidence • Evidence at the hotel • The ability to change interviews frequently • Tech support on call • Decent food • Endless caffeine What is an unreasonable expectation from a team?

7. Team Focus • Anything you identified in your self-evaluation as a problem • Anything currently on ACCJC’s radar • Any particular interests of the team member • The Rubrics (which may be phased out)

9. New Standards Effective SP 2016 • A significant rearrangement of standards • Elimination of sub-standards • Some significant additions • And don’t call it a Self-Study!

10. The Nitty-Gritty: Standard I • Mission (IA) • Some elements to consider: • Are intended students identified? • Are learning outcomes mentioned or implied? • Was development of mission statement inclusive? • How is effectiveness assessed using data? • What is cycle to review mission statement? Is it followed? Is the review process inclusive? • Can you demonstrate that the mission statement is central to college planning? • How is it communicated?

11. Mission Statement Realities • Don’t claim you review it regularly if you don’t • The new standards put more emphasis on using data to prove the college accomplishes its mission • Usually reviewed by CEOs on team

12. Assuring Academic Quality and Institutional Effectiveness (IB) • Key elements: • Dialogue about student learning and processes • What hard evidence do you have? • What results have come from dialogue? • What will your colleagues tell the team? • SLOs and SAOs moved to this section • Institution-set standards determined and published

13. IB continued • Measurable goals • What was the process to set college goals? • Was it inclusive? Will staff say it was? • Where and how are they used in planning, resource allocation, etc.? • What data is used to show progress toward goals? • Is the data disaggregated? • Planning process • Is there broad involvement? • Are resources allocated consistent with goals? • Have the results of resource allocation been measured? • Are policies and practices regularly evaluated?

14. Institutional Integrity (IC) • Is all information given in any form to any group accurate? • Does catalog include elements listed separately? • Are students informed about costs? • Does college have policies on academic freedom and honesty, and publish them? • Some language that applies mainly to for-profits…

15. The Nitty-Gritty: Standard II • IIA. Instructional Programs • While this is the heart of what we do at the college, most colleges do not get into trouble for Standard II, with a couple of exceptions: • SLO assessment and comparable support for online students • Allocation of resources to support instruction, library, etc.

16. Current standards • Must have some kind of program review/vitality assessment process • Must assess student learning needs to inform programs • Must determine if students meet learning outcomes at all levels, and use results for improvement

17. Must use “delivery systems” that meet student needs and assess their effectiveness • Must have a process to determine what is offered as credit, community ed, pre-collegiate, etc. • Must have active advisory committees for CTE programs and graduates must meet employment standards

18. General education should include all components listed in the standard and GELOs should exist and be assessed • Must have program elimination process • Must publicize student learning assessment results

19. Changes in New Standards • Syllabi must include course SLOs • Clock to credit hour standards • Emphasis on scheduling in a manner that facilitates student completion

20. IIB. Library and Learning Support • Need to have sufficient library, computer lab, tutoring and other services as evidenced by regular assessment • Must have “comparable services” online and at off-site locations, plus adequate access • Must address how services advance achievement of SLOs and assess the students

21. IIC. Student Support Services • Difficult to be sanctioned based on this section – must have “clear pathways” for students and support to reach goals • Essentially, there is a process to determine support needs and to assess their effectiveness (often through SAOs), including placement, advising, and online services • Standards for co-curricular and athletic programs, including relation to mission

22. Standard III. Resources • Technically, not under the CIO area and CIOs would rarely be assigned to this standard • Human Resources: should make sure faculty hiring follows a process and all faculty meet MQs or are approved through equivalency process approved by local Senate • As CIO, responsible for regular evaluation of all faculty

23. The Big Issue • Current standard: “Faculty…have, as a component of their evaluation, effectiveness in producing…learning outcomes.” • New standards: “The evaluation of faculty, academic administrators, and others….includes, as a component…consideration of how these employees use the results of the assessment of learning outcomes to improve teaching and learning.” • Also – “Faculty job descriptions include development of and review of curriculum as well as assessment of learning.”

24. Must have a “sufficient number of qualified faculty” – will your faculty agree? • Must have a process to identify and deliver appropriate professional development for faculty, and evaluate what is provided • Must show impact of professional development • Must integrate part-time faculty into the college

25. Physical and Technology Resources: How are needs identified, funded and evaluated? How are allocations connected to college goals and student learning needs? • Is technology sufficient for identified student needs? Are academic employees trained? • Financial resources support student learning

26. Policies and ERs • DE Policy • Transfer of Credit • Contractual Relationships • ERs: Are often cited in sanctions

27. The Big Picture/Wrap Up

28. Meridith’s Advice • Whatever your process is for planning, assessing SLOs, resource allocation, etc., make sure you can produce DOCUMENTS and show that the process is evaluated regularly and results in changes. • Make sure (almost) everyone can tell the team what the processes are AND that they had opportunity for input. Keep evidence that employees were given chances to comment.

29. And…. • If you come through a visit with sanctions, it will likely be your fault as the ALO….. • But if you are successful, there will be “too many people to thank” • Just accept it….