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Discussion Paper Index PageACCREDITATION: BEAN COUNTING OR SUBSTANTIVE ANALYSIS
Pat Farrell; Leisure Studies Program, School of
Hotel, Restaurant and Recreation Management,
the Pennsylvania State University
(originally published in Trends, Vol. 30, Number 3, 1993, pp. 40-43)
Any process that is directed towards regulation, by its very nature,
is usually as specific as the regulatory body can afford or design.
Few would argue that standards are not necessary in our highly
developed technological society. In almost every aspect of
government, industry, education, health services, safety regulations,
etc., there has been interest in setting a standard for preferred
practice.
The service professions have been late entrants to use the
accreditation technique yet have brought a significant aspect to the
standards design process. It might be characterized as both an effort
to raise the level of professionalism to a particular profession as
well as protectionism of the profession itself. The former is a
laudable context for the development of standards resulting in an
accreditation process, while the latter has a far side that could be
evidence of professional insecurity.
Regulation in the Human Services
The service profession has generally had difficulty defining
itself, its boundaries and those qualities acceptable for employment
in the variety of agencies. In particular, the human service
professions have had an additional challenge to define what are the
successful qualities that are acceptable for personnel in these
service fields. Recreation and park professions share this dilemma of
identification of pathways to success. In addition, this same
professional field is served to a large extent by people who have
never had professional preparation, and the resulting effect is many
who have served have been particularly successful in both performance
and leadership in the field.
Development of Standards for Recreation and Parks
Thus, the efforts to bring a professional code or standardized
preparation process to the field of recreation and parks has been
long, frustrating and exciting, yet not without the real agonies of
putting in place a program that has generally been assumed to be a
significant step in our evolving process of professionalizing our
field. Years of real devotion to this task have been given by some of
our finest and best. And yet our existing document may require major
revision which could demonstrate a quantum step in professional
maturity.
Perhaps digression would be appropriate here. The field of
recreation and parks (as well as other salient titles) has always had
an underdog attitude, and rightly so. We have struggled for respect
in the human services field, the colleges and universities, the
resource fund allocation processes, etc., and find ourselves always
having to defend the idea of leisure, or argue that professionals are
needed to bring sophistication and a value added essence to park and
recreation services in both the public and private venues. So, when
the time is right to think about standards of practice, licensing,
accreditation, et al., we are unable to shed this "less than" image.
And in this context it is tempting to design a system that might be
termed a "we'll show them how rigorous and professional we can be"
document. The intention to raise the professional image and abilities
of those serving the field is particularly sound, yet the context in
which standards are thus determined tends to be open for the
criticism that there is still evidence of a professional immaturity
and defensiveness in the final document.
Where Should Accreditation be Directed?
It is this writer's opinion that the development of criteria for
accreditation in the recreation, resources and parks professional
fields has strayed across the line of a professional enhancement, to
far too much attention to fine points and unnecessary detail.
We have spent too many years attempting to find the real focus of
what we wished to accredit in the academy. Should accreditation be
only for the undergraduate program? Or should graduate programs be
credited? What about options? What options are we willing to approve?
These new options that spring up at some universities - are they
acceptable, or are additional criteria needed? The process to be
approved by the Council on Post-Secondary Accreditation [now
Commission on Recognition of Post-Secondary Accreditation] was
helpful in answering some of these questions. We have all tried to
find these answers. And we are making these efforts still in an
atmosphere of professional uncertainty. Those of us who have been
given the opportunity to adjust, modify, delete and create standards
have agonized very little over some of these fundamental questions.
Mostly we have attempted to write clear and understandable criteria
that we believe are "important" elements in professional
preparation.
The Process
Our current criteria and standards document is well-organized,
clearly sectioned for solid organization, written in fair and
understandable terms and generally is a useful guide for those
schools wishing to apply and / or renew for accreditation. No matter
what the size of the student body, the faculty serving the program,
the university whether undergraduate and/or graduate, five or no
options, this one document serves as the single point for
accreditation reporting and analysis. Those who have prepared the
self report know the process to be lengthy and an organizational
challenge for sharing information. These reports over the years from
universities have varied dramatically. From voluminous notebooks of
500 pages each to a single, crisply written l50-page report would be
a fair characterization of the self studies. In all reports there
are, by virtue of the requirements, appendices attached which include
faculty vita, course outlines, policies and additional
college/university-wide information.
All of these data are reviewed by the visiting team as well as
members of the Council on Accreditation, a joint body formed by NRPA
and AALR. The first-time costs of this process are high enough to
make this process a serious budget consideration. And although most
college and university administrations are fully knowledgeable
regarding accreditation processes, justification is usually required.
With significant expenses comes serious questions of the value added
context to the school. Fortunately, our affiliation with the Council
on Post-Secondary Education has eased the harsh justification battle
some of the early applicants sought with their central administrative
offices.
People and Resources
Thus, the involvement of many people is required and costs follow
this activity in every way from staff time to prepare the self report
to the final appearance before the Council. At the minimum, at least
20 people will read the report. Half this number will spend hours
beyond measure in working with the document both in its writing and
in the analysis of how well the self report matches the criteria for
the standards. Each reader sees and understands in different ways. At
this point, the criteria become the focal point of the accreditation
process.
The report writer reads the description of the standard and
understands that his or her program does or does not meet the
criteria and responds accordingly in the report. As the visiting
committee investigates each standard of the report written by College
ABC, their analysis may note some question about a specific item in
the self report; so during the team visit, questions are asked and
discussion follows. This is a natural process that continues until
the visitation team has completed its on-site review. Of course, the
visiting team submits its report as an advisory group to Council.
Standards are again reviewed and those in question are discussed.
It then becomes the Council's task to decide whether a standard,
as it was written, has been met. Standards written for clear
understanding on the part of those preparing the self report are now
being analyzed under scrutiny not possible in the written text.
Subtle notions of quality, fine points of accomplishment, numbers and
counting of items have been undefined. Judgments differ on many
points of involvement and those left to make the final decision are
occasionally guided by their own views rather than an exact and
literal use of the standard itself. Let it be said quickly that this
is expected as a function of human nature and well-intentioned people
trying to do a difficult task.
Yet the consequences of this fuzzy distance between the written
word and the understandings brought to the decision at every step of
the process could cause some difficulties. Further, there is another
significant side to the standards themselves.
With so many standards, it is difficult for Council members (or
any of us) to defend each and every criterion as absolutely
necessary. Does every criterion carry the same weight? If there are
more than 5 percent of the criteria unmet, should accreditation be
denied? What is our legal basis for insisting on each and every
criterion? An argument can be made that the composite of criteria is,
in fact, a necessity. That the interrelationship of each criterion
with every other one makes a whole cloth. And it is here that perhaps
we have overdone the detail required for crisp analysis of whether a
program should be accredited. Even though many have labored hard and
well in the design of this system, it seems that now might be a good
time to step back from our document and our experience with
accreditation and reflect on its value to the profession, its
efficiency, its cost requirements, its level of sophistication within
the larger university system, and whether we are able to measure any
significant results after managing this process for about 15
years.
A Wider View of Accreditation
Accreditation has spread to almost every discipline within the
university curriculum. University administrators are beginning to be
wary of accrediting units that come onto the campus and encourage
additional resources to be given to specific units - all in the name
of accreditation standards. Some accrediting units have handled this
with more sophistication than others. Needless to say, university
administrators are beginning to resent the pressure from these
visiting teams, especially in light of the current economic situation
in higher education.
All of this to say - is it time to review our process in light of
how we make accreditation decisions? Are we confident enough
professionally to be a leader in modifying our accreditation system?
Are we ready to be critical of our process in an evaluative context
and determine whether major changes are needed? Or secondarily, are
we willing to measure and assess the effects of accreditation?
Perhaps it is too soon to do nothing when all the signals are
pointing to administrative resistance to "outside rules," forcing
resource allotments, programs being deleted from the university
curricula in spite of their accreditation status and criteria that
need serious attention, all point to a call for boldness and
redirection.
Is it Bean Counting Time or What?
How might we redirect our process? An article without a few
suggestions is incomplete, so here are a few thoughts:
1. Refocus the total effort of accreditation to the course
outlines which should include measurable course objectives,
assignments, reading and reference materials as well as copies of
examinations. These materials would be confidential to a small number
of selected reviewers who would assess the quality of the learning
experience design for each course as well as how well the evaluative
criteria had been met. Reviewers would feed back to an accreditation
team chair for each university.
This chair then would be the single visitor to the school applying
for accreditation. His or her task would be to assess the general
nature of the department, administrative structures and comparative
data points across the university.
2. For those who would support the position that a curriculum is
as good as the faculty it is suggested that a team be chosen to
review only the curriculum vita of the faculty and staff of the unit
applying for accreditation.
The team members would assess the quality of the personnel and
recommend to a team chair a point value developed for score ranges.
This system would require redesigning the standards into a much
broader set of philosophical statements and thus require the
department to announce itself to the reviewing team.
The team chair would then be a single visitor to the college or
university. The chair's presentation to the Council would be much
more quality driven and focused on the excellence factors rather than
minimal standard levels.
3. Design standards for faculty that are similar in context to the
tenure and promotion elements. If there are too many worrisome
aspects to option number 2 above, then state in specific numbers what
faculty accomplishment should be over a 3-to 5-year period.
The intent of this system is to acknowledge that as the faculty
matures and produces, the students will become beneficiaries of this
scholarly and academic activity.
Summary
It is important that the reader understand that this writer is not against accreditation, but only in the way it is designed to work. The title expresses more clearly the context of this point. Our current guidelines reflect more detail than is necessary, and signals our immaturity as a profession as we make every point so clear that there is no room for judgment. And yet it is judgment that is required to assess quality and excellence by those who are able to objectively judge value. Just as we believe our system is airtight in terms of clarity, we know that well-intentioned people let words mean different things to each of us and, therefore, many decisions are both inside and outside the standards as they are written. So, this is a call to pull back from such detail and find a way to have this review process move to a higher level of quality. If we dare!