Department of Education concludes ACCJC violated Federal regulations in three areas

Earlier today (August 13), the US Department of Education issued a letter to ACCJC saying that the Commission is out of compliance with several of the standards required of accreditation agencies. You can read the official letter here.

The Department of Education concluded that the ACCJC violated federal regulations in three key areas: concerns about conflicts of interest, the fact that no “deficiencies” about CCSF were identified in 2006, and insufficient faculty representation on accreditation teams.

This means that the federal education department agrees with CFT and AFT 2121 that ACCJC’s process of reviewing City College—and other colleges, too—for accreditation is tainted and needs to be fixed. ACCJC’s own accreditation may be in question if they don’t shape up. Perhaps we might call this their own “show cause” sanction.

This doesn’t reverse the ACCJC decision on City College, but it does put ACCJC further on the ropes, makes it that much clearer to the rest of the world that the concerns we have raised are indeed valid, and provides additional basis to challenge ACCJC’s accreditation decision.