Accreditataion
One tyhing i have always found perticularly alarming is how some regionally accreditted schools will call our students and bad mouth national accrediatation. This is a practice I feel is detrimental to career colleges. Has anyone else expirennced this and how did they combat it?
I like your approach to this topic. I have worked for both regionally accredited and nationally accredited colleges (both non-profit and for profit). What I have found is that most people who inquire have no clue what regional or national accreditation is. They just want to know whether their credits will transfer if they choose to attend another school. At that point I say, "Transferrability of credits is up to the receiving institution" because no matter what type of school it is, this is the truth.
I agree that there seems to be substantial misdirection from four year institutions about the differences in accreditation.
I simply state that "there are different types of accreditation and each have their strengths. Let's talk about our accreditation and what it means for our school."
It takes away the negativity, informs them about our school, and takes the conversation away from the other school in question. It also keeps conversation professional.
Samantha,
Yes. There are several career colleges and private for-profit universities in Ohio that are regionally accredited.
John Ware
That is very interesting and unfortunate.
Now I have a followup question to this that I would like to pose, can a career college ever becoem eligible for the regional accrediatation?
I am in my first week, but all I have heard is that is never to be done. It is unfortunate that some people feel the need to go to that extreme.
I agree, the sad thing is that most schools who are Regionally accredited don't even do the research or inform their employees on what it means be Nationally Accredited. They just decide to give out false information to prospective students which can cause a lot of confusion.
However, despite the confusion and sometimes frustration with not all but some Universities, it is always best to correct the prospect in a calm manner and just relay the correct information regarding the Accreditation your school is under.
Absolutely!
I think in any situation, if you come accross as you care to the student, they will pay more attention to what you have to say. Being defensive and attacking another school just puts us at their level and we're better than that.
The student will see that we don't have to put down another school to make ours look better, and we will gain their trust.
Tria,
I really like your approach to dealing with that situation. Do you feel the student relaxes and listens to what you have to say?
Kimberly Stein
I have experienced this a lot over the last 4 years, working at a career college! I just make sure to always keep my proffesionalism and never bad mouth them back! The student will see that you don't need to talk bad about another school to make yours look more appealing, and it will gain the trust of that prospect to see your confidence in your college. For example, many times I hear students say something like "I heard your school isn't accredited by my advisor at..."
I simply reply "I'm sorry your advisor was unclear of our accreditation. Let me go over that with you"
