Monitoring the Gatekeepers - Paul Fain, Inside Higher Ed

The Obama administration continues to turn up pressure on accreditors, promising in new letter to measure the agencies against their peers and urging more focus on student achievement and troubled colleges. On Friday, the administration told accreditors to focus more on enforcing standards that measure student achievement and to consider additional scrutiny for colleges with significant problems. The new guidance from the U.S. Department of Education is the latest in a series of attempts by the White House to encourage accreditors to tighten up in their role as gatekeepers for federal financial aid. A group of 24 U.S. Senate Democrats also weighed in on accreditation on Friday. In a letter to the department, the senators said accreditors too often allow colleges with “shockingly poor performance” to retain their accreditation. https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2016/04/25/education-department-tells-accreditors-focus-more-troubled-colleges-and-standards