Education Policy, Business and Technology

Inside the Oversight of a Questionable Institution

Inside Higher Ed: Accreditation is supposed to make sure that all colleges meet certain basic, minimum standards. But in the case of the American College of Commerce and Technology, a now defunct for-profit institution in Virginia, state higher education authorities identified such severe problems that they began moving to shut the college down less than a year after it received initial accreditation.

ACCT, an institution that at one point enrolled nearly 1,900 students, the vast majority of whom were from outside the U.S. and on F-1 visas, received initial accreditation from the Accrediting Council for Independent Colleges and Schools in April 2015. The following February, state regulators auditing the college likened it to a "visa mill" and a "diploma mill." A letter state regulators sent to the college in March 2016 said they were considering a recommendation to revoke ACCT’s certificate to operate.

Read article