Overview

With policymakers and the public increasingly focused on accountability in higher education, accrediting agencies have come under greater scrutiny.  Our team has helped accreditors communicate their core values and mission, address criticism, and promote the value of accreditation.

Our Work: The Projects

For a national accrediting agency facing heightened scrutiny of its career college member institutions, we developed core messages highlighting the organization’s track record of holding institutions accountable to rigorous accreditation standards.  We also designed media response protocols to guide when the organization should engage in the public dialogue surrounding the for-profit college industry.

Our team also helped a programmatic accrediting organization navigate public challenges to using graduation from an accredited institution as an employment requirement or standard for licensing.  An in-depth digital landscape analysis provided important insight about the opposition to inform response protocols and messaging that highlighted accreditation as a recognized national standard that supports shared industry goals. A series of statements, Q&A, and fact sheets on sensitive issues helped the organization tell its positive story to key audiences.