Emily Flores-Amaya
In 2022, President Timothy Trainor launched the Reaccreditation Self-Study for the renewal of the Middle States accreditation for the Mount for 2024. This process is being led by the Self-Study Steering Committee. The Middle States Commission on Higher Education is in charge of accrediting schools such as the Mount in parts of Maryland as well as other states.
According to Dr. Christine Blackshaw, the co-chair of the Self-Study Steering Committee, “The Self-Study Process for the Middle States Commission is an intensive and comprehensive review of all aspects of the university’s operations and functions to identify our strengths and challenges so that we can improve over time. We hope to engage all members of our community in an inclusive and transparent self-evaluation process that leads to overall improvement in student success, campus environment and financial sustainability.”
According to Mount St. Mary’s website, Middle States provides the university’s Institutional Accreditation. Accreditations are important for schools to get funding. If a school loses its accreditation, “its students will probably not be able to participate in either Federal or State of Maryland financial assistance programs,” according to the Maryland Higher Education Commission.
Dr. Micheal Towle, the chair of the Political Science department at the Mount and a member of the Self-Study Steering Committee, states that these accreditation commissions “were partly developed so that the government doesn’t directly regulate colleges; instead, we regulate ourselves through these commissions.”
Towle explains that, “Everybody who shares a standard is on the Steering Committee. We submitted our standard to Blackshaw and Simmons and they put them together in one report.”
According to the Middle States Commission on Higher Education website there are several standards schools must be committed to. Towle was in charge of the Standard II of Ethics and Integrity.
After the Mount’s report is submitted a team will come to Mount St. Mary's in April which consists of people from other colleges and they will have read the report and then they will interview people to make sure the school is doing what it has stated it will do written report.
Then, at the end of their time on campus they will issue a response. Usually on the third day, the chair of the team and a team of people comes and they will issue a report publicly at the end of their visit and in general what they do is they will first give a public report but there is no questions allowed they will basically say what they found and then you get a written response that could include recommendations.
Towle states, “Recommendations are things actually that you have to improve, they will otherwise state how well you are doing on the different standards. Sometimes they require a follow up, hopefully not, requiring a progress report in two years on how you are doing on Standard II.”
The Middle States deadline of 2024 is coming up and the Steering committee has been working diligently to finalize the Mount’s report. The Middle States accreditation is a very important process that helps the Mount as well as other schools govern themselves.
Kelly Blanco