EVERY COURSE IS NOT ACCREDITED ……somewhere!

It’s enough to make you very suspicious, but every course every offered is not accredited somewhere.

The reality though is that nothing is accredited everywhere; and in fact most courses (even Harvard or Oxforddegrees), are not formally recognized or accredited by most countries or accrediting bodies.

Accreditation bodies all have a limited purpose or scope of operation. Usually governments are only concerned with accrediting certain types of courses and within their own jurisdiction; and professional bodies are only concerned with their own members or constituency.

Credibility is what counts!

The critical issues are

·“Are you studying with someone credible?”, and

·“Will the course give me a valuable education?”

How to tell if a course has widespread credibility.

Nothing can ever guarantee a courses value as 100% foolproof, but there are several things that can indicate credibility.

Consider the following checklist; and courses that check on more counts are likely to be more credible than those that match less.

·Duration of a course – it stands to reason that you cannot learn as much in a very short course.

·Quality of staff –consider qualifications, quantity and quality of experience. (eg:http://www.acs.edu.au/info/school/about.aspx)

·Services offered –consider how accessible tutors are, what additional services have been developed (eg: http://www.acs.edu.au/info/welcome.swf)

·How well established is the institution – long established institutions are more likely to be sound

·Visibility –an institution that is known widely within a discipline; employs staff that have international reputations and/or is ranked high on internet searches will hold greater international credibility than one that is obscure and known little beyond their own town

·Reputation –accreditation, recognition, partnerships and affiliations are indications of the regard held for this institution by other organisations or institutions. These relationships are an indicator, but their value is in turn only as strong as the credibility of the other organization.

·Graduate success –satisfied and successful graduates are the most certain indicator of a courses value. (eg. http://www.acsedu.co.uk/Info/About-Us/student-testimonials.aspx)

Any college that is credible should present it’s credentials clearly (eg. http://www.acseduonline.com/recognition.aspx)

Every Country is Different

There are in fact thousands of different recognition and accreditation systems around the world, some run by professional industry bodies, some by independent accreditation bodies, and some by governments. Every one of these likes to beat there drum and make out they are the best; but if you look into the issue deep enough and use a little common sense, you will start to see everything is not accredited in most places.

Many developed countries only tend to formally recognize qualifications accredited by themselves; and don’t readily cater to accrediting qualifications from even leading universities in other countries. A degree that is accredited in the USAis not necessarily going to be accepted formally in Australiaor Europe, and vice versa.

It is often impractical, very expensive, or even impossible for colleges and universities to get courses accredited beyond their own countries borders even if they wanted to. The fact that the course might not be accredited may not be all that important though.

Accreditation comes at a Cost; and sometimes with limited benefits

It costs a lot of money to get and retain accreditations; so the more accredited a course is, the more of your fees are going into the accreditation, and that usually means either the college is taking bigger profits; or the college is putting more of your fees into actually providing a service.

Accreditation may be critical when dealing with certain disciplines such as law and medicine; where lack of 100% control over the education system can lead to serious problems later on. Without accreditation in such critical industries; a successful career may be impossible to kick start.

For many other disciplines though, the critical value of accreditation is simply not there.

If a course is credible, and the institution ethical; you may well get far more value for a non accredited course than one that is accredited.