21st Century Governance
Contact Us
  • Home
  • The Governance Corner
  • Learning to Learn Differently
  • Support for Schools

The Governance Corner

A forum for discussing issues in Independent School governance in the second decade of the 21st Century

Read all Posts

Searching for Value: the limits of Accreditation

7/18/2013

0 Comments

 
Picture
It is difficult to find an independent school anywhere these days that isn't accredited by someone. In most provinces, the provincial government provides significant funding and those monies come with some form of regular oversight to ensure that the programme and academic standards are consistent with Ministry expectations. In other jurisdictions (Ontario, New Brunswick, the United States, etc.) parents and Boards of Governors must depend on outside accrediting bodies to provide feedback on the quality of both academics and operations. Some accrediting groups (such as the International Baccalaureate/IB organization) focus primarily on programme; while others (such as the Canadian Accredited Independent Schools/CAIS; the New England Association of Schools and Colleges/NEASC; the European Council of Independent Schools/CIS; etc.) offer a more comprehensive look at the overall picture of the school. 

While all of these systems are reasonably effective, they are hampered by some basic flaws that lessen the value of the services that they provide. To begin with, most accrediting bodies are organized on the basis of peer review. While offering the advantages of relevance (people who are facing the same challenges and constraints), currency (active practitioners, not potentially out of date consultants) , and breadth (teams with a wide range of expertise and experience); the accreditation process is only as strong as the quality and professionalism of the people selected for the review team. I have had many Board Chairs express their concern to me that a review team consisting primarily of teachers and administrators would not only be limited in their scope in terms of understanding some of the larger issues facing a school; but would also be inclined to provide "cover" for the Head and staff by downplaying systemic or personnel shortcomings. It has also been suggested that being too immersed in independent school culture, makes it difficult to stand back and give dispassionate and balanced advice.


The second challenge that some "membership" organizations face is the fact that they consistently face a basic conflict of interest. Although they might rattle the chains sometimes and give only conditional or deferred accreditation to a school; the instances of a total withdrawal of approval are extremely rare. After all, denying accreditation also means terminating membership in the organization with the resulting loss in fees and reduction in membership numbers.


Finally, most accrediting bodies operate on a five to ten year re-accreditation cycle and we all know that that represents a huge time span in the life of a school. Leadership changes at the Board or administration level, enrolment fluctuations, a downturn in advancement revenues, etc. can all turn a school on its head in a very short period of time.


In actual fact, current accreditation systems are less about measuring school performance; administrative efficiency; and, financial sustainability and more about on-going school improvement. If Boards approach an accreditation process as developmental, rather than evaluative, then they are more likely to feel that they are getting at least some value for their investment.

Having said that, there is still a need for some arm's length assessment of the overall performance of the school to ensure that Boards can effectively exercise their oversight function. What that assessment process should look like will be the focus of my next blog entry.

0 Comments



Leave a Reply.

    Author

    Dr. Jim Christopher
    has been working with Boards and Heads on Governance issues for the past 15 years. He is a former Superintendent of Schools, ED of the Canadian Association of Independent Schools and Canadian Educational Standards Institute and is the author of a number of books and articles of education and governance. His latest book, Beyond the Manual: A Realist's Guide to Independent School Governance is available on iTunes or at https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/388729

    View my profile on LinkedIn
    21stC Podcast

    Archives

    March 2022
    April 2020
    July 2019
    March 2019
    September 2018
    July 2018
    February 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    April 2016
    September 2015
    August 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    January 2015
    November 2014
    October 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013
    November 2013
    October 2013
    September 2013
    August 2013
    July 2013
    June 2013
    May 2013
    April 2013

    Categories

    All

    RSS Feed

Proudly powered by Weebly