Negotiated Rulemaking Program Integrity and Institutional Quality - 3/7/24 

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 DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION

 OFFICE OF POSTSECONDARY EDUCATION

 NEGOTIATED RULEMAKING PROGRAM INTEGRITY 

AND INSTITUTIONAL QUALITY 

 SESSION 3, DAY 4, AFTERNOON

MARCH 7, 2024

On the 7th day of March, 2024, the following 

meeting was held virtually, from 1:00 p.m. to 5:00 

p.m.
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P R O C E E D I N G S

MR. ROBERTS: Welcome back, everyone, 

for the afternoon session of this final day of the 2024 

Negotiated Rulemaking Committee. We're going to pick 

right up with our discussion on accreditation. It's my 

understanding that Michale McComas, the alternate for 

institutional accrediting agencies, has a question on the 

conversation as we left it at lunch, and I'll turn it 

right over to him.

MR. MCCOMIS: Thanks, Brady. And I 

just- I wanted to just take a minute and go back to 

602.19 (b) and that language and just maybe offer a bit 

of a caution to the Department on unintended 

consequences. So, you know, I've spent a fair amount of 

time through appeals, arbitration, and the court system 

defending adverse accreditation decisions. And I worry 

that the words the most current and the word available 

will hinder accrediting agencies from being able to take 

enforcement actions based upon a wide array of 

information. So let me just maybe give an example. I 

worry about the word available because it's so broad that 

it's- the argument on the other side is, well, the agency 

didn't take into account everything that was available 

when it made its adverse accreditation decision or they 

didn't take into account the most current information. 
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And so if an agency uses something like a benchmark or 

metric, more likely than not that metric is based on some 

kind of lagging data. And while the institution may 

provide more current, the standard may not really be 

based on any kind of metric for retention data or 

something along those particular lines. And so I just 

worry that including that language there can open up a 

cause of action unintentionally for institutions to be 

able to, to say, well, you didn't take into account the 

most current or you didn't take into the universe of 

everything that was available. So I would just ask the 

Department to consider striking the words the most 

current and the word available in that 602.19 (b). Thank 

you.

MR. ROBERTS: Alright. Thank you, 

Michale. And Jamie, you'll be rejoining us at the table? 

Great. Okay. Welcome back. Any other comments on 602.19 

or 602.20? Yeah, Jamie.

MS. STUDLEY: Yeah. Checking that I 

wasn't muted. Coming back to- I'll start with good- the 

good cause extension item. I think people recognize that 

we're moving here from unlimited room for good cause 

extensions to one year, which is less than the two years 

that had been mentioned at another point, I think. And 

while- if it were- if I were holding the pen, I'd make it 
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two. We also appreciate the urgency to move toward 

conclusion with institutions and so we have an objective 

to the one year. It may be tight but tight in the 

interest of getting to decisions where institutions are 

not in compliance seems a reasonable balance and would be 

prepared to live with it and move institutions in that 

way if necessary. We also appreciate the recognition of 

allowing time for the student achievement-related arenas 

and for institutions to work toward better outcomes for 

students. You've heard me talk about the momentum that 

we're seeing for outcomes and data. As data gets better, 

accreditors rely on it more and more. When IPEDS got over 

the full-time, first-time, full-time constraints and gave 

us broader, more usable data, accreditors use it and rely 

on it more. I- as I mentioned, my agency for one is 

posting debt-to-earnings and ROI information by program 

for institutions, and we will use it in our conversations 

with institutions about how they're doing relative to 

appropriately benchmarked other institutions. So that 

leaves the real sticking point for me, which is turning 

the identification of expectations in 602.16, which is 

it- in- many of us read it as saying, yeah, we're doing a 

lot of that. That's not a change in practice to identify 

how outcomes need to be incorporated in the conversation. 

Accreditation has changed and it's changed in these 
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regards. But turning identification of expectations in 16 

into enforcement levels in .20, is really creating bright 

lines. The Department has said it agrees that we 

shouldn't have bright lines, and it's telling agencies 

what their standard ought to be [30 seconds] and we've 

talked about that. So for me, this is the issue that is 

the most dangerous. And I'll come back momentarily to 

explain why.

MR. ROBERTS: Thank you, Jamie. Scott, 

go ahead.

MR. DOLAN: Yeah, I just want, I mean, 

to support Jamie's point, right? We've seen a ton of 

progress recently around expectations for evidence that 

our accreditors are putting forth for us. And it's helped 

institutions like mine. You know, the mechanisms in place 

that we have to support our reflections and our reviews 

are across a wide range of categories. You know, I 

mentioned last time our annual institutional update, we 

provide data, quantitative data to our accreditor every 

year on student demographics, enrollment, student 

achievement, financial results. Our most recent audit 

findings. I've heard numerous times that these are 

lagging indicators. We are reporting this to our 

accreditor every single year, and they take action on 

this. They ask for supplemental information reports when 
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something is of concern, they can take more serious 

actions if the data presents itself that way. During our 

self-study report, it's not just a written, selfreflective essay, I apologize, it's just not. That- to 

say that is just a lack of understanding of what

accreditation is. There are mountains of evidence that 

institutions provide, quantitative and qualitative, 

written records, contracts, the whole gamut that we're 

providing to our accreditors as a component of this. And 

we're reviewing this and evaluating not only from a selfassessment, but from a set of qualified peer reviewers as 

well. And I'm very appreciative of the work that Middle 

States has done more recently under the guidance of 

NACIQI, to provide even more consistent guidelines around 

their expectations for evidence, right. Just an example. 

And I can link to the guidebook that Middle States 

provides to us as institutions. But under Mission, 

provide evidence of trend analysis of progress towards 

meeting established student achievement goals for the

last four years, including retention rates, graduation 

rates, transfer rates, placement rates, and more. So this 

idea that we're not ongoing providing data and evidence 

to our accreditors and that this is not informing our 

practices, just lacks a real understanding of the work 

that we're doing with integrity, not just a focus on 
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compliance, but also in a focus on setting high bars and 

standards for ourselves around continuous improvement. 

Accreditors recognize, institutions recognize that 

evidence should be mission-specific and relative to the 

mission and goals of the institutions, and that this 

needs to be reviewed within the context of the standards 

and the mission of institutions. It's reflective of the 

understanding that institutions have [30 seconds] 

different models for education and operational 

excellence. And the reality is, that's one of the 

hallmarks of US higher education, which I want to remind 

folks here, remains a gold standard globally. So while 

there are instances of bad actors and we need to address 

those to protect all students, we should also remind 

ourselves of the great work that we're doing together to 

provide access and quality in ways that a lot of 

countries around the world would be envious, envious of. 

So, let's continue that work.

MR. ROBERTS: Thank you, Scott. David, 

speaking on behalf of proprietary institutions, will be 

coming to the table. But before him, Jamie, you are up 

next.

MS. STUDLEY: Thank you. Scott 

mentioned NACIQI, and that really took me back to 20, I 

believe 12, when NACIQI, for the first time after the 
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official presentations by the agencies, for the first 

time, said, how are you thinking about student outcomes? 

There were some agencies that looked like deer in 

headlights and didn't know what we were talking about. 

Compare that to what NACIQI and the Senior Department 

Official expected in this round of reviews and the 

informed data-oriented outcomes directed responses of the 

accrediting agencies. That is a strategy, a direction 

that is really paying off and making a difference. 

Someone gave me a great phrase that fits here about the 

danger of making flags into axes. I'm concerned as 

somebody who really believes in the value of outcomes 

used well to drive institutional results. But I- I'm 

afraid that these two provisions in regulation, could set 

back rather than support the work that's being done. 

Instead of making outcomes more visible and people 

spending their time and energy on incorporating the more 

seriously- into accreditation discussions, which takes 

training of schools and reviewers and commissions to be 

able to do that thoughtfully. And developing subtlety 

which I recognize 16 really makes an effort to say it has 

to be appropriate and feasible and so forth. But we- but 

given the formal effect of noncompliance in 20, the 

effect would be to ask accreditors to spend lots of time 

to pick, validate, justify data. And you can't do it with 
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just one data point. You would have to look at multiple 

data points for multiple different institutions, and 

think about how they operate together and defend them to 

a level that would support a noncompliance decision, as 

opposed to moving them forward and being able to say, you 

know, your graduation rate is strong, but your debt-toearnings or return on investment is not good for most of 

your programs. So you can't choose to- in that case you 

wouldn't want just graduation rate. But you would have to 

validate and work out all of those metrics. [30 seconds] 

You couldn't do that, you would hesitate to include them, 

which would deprive the discussion of the thoughtfulness 

of all of those points. It's enforcing them as compliance 

lines that makes them unacceptable. I want to use 

multiple measures, and I am prepared to say that you have 

not succeeded based on those multiple measures. I'd 

rather spend my time doing that in a case-by-case 

decision-making, instead of having to build the kind of 

structure and defend it at great risk that is described 

here. I think we would be closer to our shared goals.

MR. ROBERTS: Thank you, Jamie. David, 

you're up next.

MR. COHEN: Thank you. I want to agree 

with Scott and the other commentators here that there 

does seem to be a true lack of understanding of how 
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rigorous the accreditation process truly is. At my 

institution, and the institutions that I represent, as 

Chair of the Association of Private Colleges in New York 

and at most accredited colleges and universities across 

the nation, we track retention rates, persistence rates, 

graduation rates, employment rates, transfer-up rates. We 

track daily attendance. We track standards of 

satisfactory academic progress. We track licensure pass 

rates. We track nearly 100 different student learning 

assessment standards across eight distinct academic 

divisions every semester, and we track nearly 100 

institutional assessment data points in the nonacademic 

realm, including 14 different administrative units. We 

disaggregate this data. We sort it in every conceivable 

way so that we can learn from it and how our diverse 

constituents are doing. We develop and monitor multi-year 

strategic plans, and we monitor our daily budget in 

comparison to forecast and in comparison to the last 

several years. We monitor the food service and online 

course sales. We monitor the academic advising process 

and the interactions with students with advisors. We 

monitor on a daily basis our interactions with students 

with disabilities, and we monitor regularly our success 

in reaching out to opportunity program students. We 

monitor grievances and complaints. We monitor requests 
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for repairs in our residence halls. We regularly survey 

our students, faculty, staff, alumni, and our largest 

employers of our graduates. We watch and monitor cohort 

default rates, and we track our bad debt reserves on a 

weekly basis. We pay attention to timelines to determine 

the last date of attendance for students struggling with 

attendance, and we track the timely refunds to Title IV 

and New York State aid programs. We undergo not less than 

three full audits every year. Our financial audit, our 

SFA audit, our retirement programs for faculty and staff, 

and periodic audits of sales tax, food service 

compliance, fire and safety, just to mention a few. We 

monitor faculty development and we evaluate their 

effectiveness with regularity. We monitor our academic 

governance process to make sure everyone has a respected 

voice. And I could go on and on. We probably monitor well 

in excess of a thousand different things on a regular and 

periodic basis annually. Many of the things we monitor 

and manage stem from good practices that our accreditors 

prioritize. [30 seconds] And we're just a tiny school. I 

really am just trying to say that I think the accrediting 

agencies are already moving in this way, and setting 

minimum standards is actually harmful because you lower 

the benchmark, you stifle innovation, and they're just 

unnecessary. I would urge you not to make them.
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MR. ROBERTS: Thanks, David. Jo, go 

ahead.

MS. BLONDIN: Yeah, so I just want to 

follow on a little bit with what David said as well. I 

think many accreditors are- have shown continuous

improvement, and that was reinforced at the February 2023 

NACIQI meeting at which HLC participated. We were 

complimented on our collective input that we have 

provided to their outcomes committee, including measures 

such as student intent and mission-specific 

accreditation. So to imagine that accreditors are not 

responsive, are not focused on continuous improvement, 

even for themselves is disingenuous. However, I will also 

say that there is room for improvement. And that's what 

that process is all about. Accreditors are not perfect, 

but I do believe that they're making very serious efforts 

and at the guidance of NACIQI to make some of these 

changes.

MR. ROBERTS: Okay. Thank you, Jo. 

Herman, I'm not seeing any new comments on this. So do 

you want to reshare the document and take us to the next 

section? Oh, Joe, I do I do see your hand. I do just want 

to remind folks that the, you know, the most helpful 

feedback is feedback that's rooted in the reg text or new 

proposal suggestions or comments on the reg text, given 
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that this is the last section of the last day. So I just 

want to remind everyone of that. But Joe, go ahead.

MR. WEGLARZ: Yeah, I just snuck my 

hand in there. You know, so being that I am out in the 

weeds with accreditation, I'm from the student financial 

services side of the house. I'm learning a lot through 

this dialog, but I guess I'm curious to what is making 

the Department propose what they're proposing. Alright. 

I've been through accreditations, alright, representing 

Student Financial Services. And I guess what would be 

helpful, if possible, to give some data on, you know, how 

many institutions do not get reaccredited, how many get 

put on probation and so forth? And to the severity of 

this accreditation policy. So this has been an eye opener 

for me. But I- I'm sure there's two sides to the story 

with accreditation and the Department. You know, it does 

deal with these situations, but, you know, any additional 

education on this would be great. Thank you.

MR. BOUNDS: Yeah, I would just say as 

far as data, I mean, we don't have any data that we could 

present to you today on, you know, number of- if you're 

asking for a number of negative adverse accreditation 

actions or, say, institutions that have been carried a 

significant amount of time in a non-compliant setting or 

whether the institution understood what it needed to do. 
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I mean, we don't have that information there. The 

language we have just proposed is- are things that wethat we think are important related to student 

achievement. And again setting some of those you know, 

minimal expectations of what an institution needs to do 

to demonstrate compliance. So probably didn't answer your 

question, but right- currently today, we just don't have 

the data to give you to answer the questions that you 

just asked of us.

MR. ROBERTS: Okay. Thank you. 

JoEllen.

MS. PRICE: Yeah, I would like to 

applaud the Department for working towards protecting 

students from institutions that are not delivering a 

quality, worthwhile education. I have actually had family 

members and friends scammed by institutions that appear 

to be more concerned about their bottom line than they 

were about the education they were delivering. My husband 

is a 24-year retired veteran who was taken advantage of 

by a bad actor in 2010, but luckily he figured it out 

early and did not lose his entire GI Bill. I personally 

visited an institution in 2018 and spoke to their 

director when they tried to take advantage of my cousin 

by enrolling her in a program that clearly would not have 

enabled her to achieve her career goal, and it was 
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expensive. They ended up disenrolling her and giving her 

her money back, and that school is no longer in business. 

Unfortunately, most students don't have someone like me 

looking out for their best interests. I understand the 

critical, important role of our accreditors and in my 

experience, they do a great job. I also, given my 37 

years in financial aid, understand the concept of 

administrative burden. I know the devil's in the details 

and not all the details are going to meet our 

expectations. I do have some concerns about some of the 

language, but as I listen to the conversations, I keep 

thinking, will these changes protect my son, my husband, 

or my cousin in the future? And I think they will, even 

though they come with concessions and compromise. Thank 

you.

MR. ROBERTS: Okay. Thank you, 

JoEllen. Herman, do you want to keep walking us through 

the document?

MR. BOUNDS: Sure. Let's see, whereso we're in student achievement. Let's go down to- I 

think we are- excuse me, we're under 602.20. We kind of 

got bounced back to some questions of student 

achievement, so I think- yeah, I think we were actually 

finished with 602.20, unless there were other comments. I 

think we're ready to move into- to move into, well, 
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nothing in 21.

MR. ROBERTS: Yeah, I think we're at 

602.22, but [inaudible]

MR. BOUNDS: I think we're ready to 

go, yeah. Yeah, I think we're ready to go to 602.22. Just 

give me a second to get there. So in 22, I will just get 

to the highlighted- to the highlighted changes. Under (j) 

is the first one. I think I'm on page 26. And here we 

added the word physical, physical additional location. 

And in (k) we added language here. I think this provides 

an exception or a carve-out for- related to prison 

education. Prison educational programs. I want to be sure 

I'm saying that right. Yeah. Okay. If we move down to- it 

looks like we're on page 27. We have some additional 

language here. And I would also say that, again, the 

majority of these changes were made because of, you know, 

comments from committee members and to kind of strike a 

compromise between what we heard in the last session. 

Under here, we have we've changed- added some language to 

those requirements, include at a minimum. And we have 

confirmation that the agreement- and we're under written 

arrangements and agreements, that agreement complies with 

the limitation on the amount of program that the 

ineligible institution or organization provides, as 

described in 668.5 and of course, that regulation covers 
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written arrangement between ineligible institutions. 

Number two, added language, a demonstration by the 

accredited institution that the ineligible institution or 

organization has sufficient administrative and fiscal 

capacity and experience to deliver the program, the 

portion of the program provided under the arrangement. 

And then the last one is just a reminder that the 

institution is still responsible to maintain compliance 

with the accrediting agencies standards in those 

particular areas. Next change is under (b). We added some 

language to the first sentence. If the agency approves a 

substantive change for an institution that is on a 

probation or equivalent status, or is currently or has 

been subject to a negative action by the agency, that 

begins the enforcement timelines of 605.20 (a) and (b) 

over the prior three academic years. Had some strike 

there. The agency must notify the Secretary within 30 

days of its approval of the substantive change. And then 

we struck language from the very last sentence. And if we 

go down to the next section. Again, on page 29, we have 

some additions. Again, physical location in several 

places. And under two, we get into the subject of 

conducting site visits under (e). And under (i), we've 

added some language also, must include all physical 

additional locations and branch campus of the institution 
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that has been placed on probation or show cause or 

equivalent status, or has been the subject of an action 

by the agent that begins the enforcement timeline to 

602.20 (b) during the accreditation cycle or final three 

years of the prior accreditation cycle. Romanette two 

must include all physical locations and branch campuses 

if the institution has fewer than 25. The key word there 

is fewer. And then under romanette three, except for 

institutions described in (i), which would be, of course, 

those that are- that have been under some sort of 

negative action by the agency may include fewer of all of 

the physical additional locations and branch campuses if 

the institution has 25 or more such locations. Key word 

there is more, but the agency must conduct the site 

visit- must conduct a site visit to 25 such locations, or 

50% of the total number of such locations, whichever is 

greater. And if the agency elects to visit fewer than all 

physical locations and branch campuses, the institution 

in an accreditation cycle, it must visit different 

physical additional locations, the branch campuses in the 

institution's next accreditation cycle. And then the 

language in- for the site visit must- excuse me, the site 

visit requirement does not apply to additional locations 

that provide prison education. And that takes us to- I 

know I went through that pretty fast. That takes us to 
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23. So I would open up conversation to discussion under 

602.22.

MR. ROBERTS: Thank you, Herman, That 

was a larger section, but any comments, questions, 

feedbacks, additional proposed text on 602.22? We'll 

start with Barmak.

MR. BOUNDS: And if we can start with 

theMR. ROBERTS: Oh, I'm sorry, go ahead.

MR. BOUNDS: Yeah, I was going to say 

to make it easier, if we could start with- you know, 

kind of work our way down through the documentMR. ROBERTS: Kind of chronological 

through the- yeah, yeah.

MR. ROBERTS: Yeah, with the- withwhere the first changes occur.

MR. ROBERTS: Go ahead, Barmak.

MR. BOUNDS: Oh, I'm sorry.

MR. NASSIRIAN: I'm farther down. 

MR. ROBERTS: Oh, you're farther- so, 

anyone have a comment, question or proposed text forwe'll call it- through page, I'm kind of making this up 

here, but 27? That first chunk of alterations.

MR. BOUNDS: Sounds good.

MR. ROBERTS: Laura, go ahead.
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DR. KING: Yeah, so this is language 

that comes up both in 602.22 as well as 602.23. And so 

I'm looking- I think the first place that it comes up is 

(n) like Nancy where it talks about- this happens to be 

about substantive change, but you know, the Department 

tried to clarify what a quote unquote negative action 

was. I think our feedback last time was a negative action 

doesn't really have a definition. And so I appreciate the 

attempt to do that. I think that it is overly expansive,

however, to have it be any action that begins the 

enforcement timeline in 602.20 (a) or (b). Those are not 

necessarily what I would consider negative actions. Those 

can be issues that are very, you know, simple and easy to 

fix that an institution or a program needs to take care 

of. So something- my example on this is a site visit team 

found an outdated student handbook on the website that 

needs to be removed. That might trigger, you know, an 

enforcement timeline. So we're telling the inst- or the 

program, we're saying you have to remove this outdated 

handbook from your website. I don't know that rises to 

the level of what you would consider a negative action. I 

think it's more of a sanction kind of action that you 

mean and I think that is more problematic to me in 602.23 

but it does- that language is repeated here. So I wanted 

to raise that. 
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MR. BOUNDS: Yeah, Laura, I want to 

just respond real quickly that the reason we added 

subject to the timelines under 602.20 (a) and (b), 

because again, that's, you know, in accordance with the 

regulation, that's what starts- that's what indicates 

that the institution or program is non-compliant with the 

standard, no matter what the issue is. If there- if the 

commission or whoever finds the institution or program 

non-compliant, then they have to start those enforcement 

timelines. And you know as well as I do agencies have 

different terminology for that particular situation. So 

we could not possibly list everything because some 

agencies may not consider a warning as a- as triggering 

enforcement timeline. So we wanted to make it broad and 

clear that if there is a situation or an occurrence at an 

institution or program that initiates those timelines, 

that's telling us that institution or program is noncompliant, and then they have to initiate those 

enforcement timelines. That's why we put that language in 

there. So it's not- wouldn't be for a minor issue. It 

would be for something that you or an agency said, no, 

this definitely means non-compliant. This doesn't mean 

monitoring. This doesn't mean, oh, it takes a couple of 

seconds to fix this. This means that you're noncompliant.
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DR. KING: Okay. So I mean, what 

you're basically saying is that agencies would need to 

adjust their own policies and procedures to call it 

something else. So call it substantial compliance or 

something else so that it would not trigger that 

timeline.

MR. BOUNDS: We don't care what you 

call it. It could- you could call it anything. But if 

it's significant enough that it's a non-compliant 

condition and those enforcement timelines apply, I mean, 

it could be monitoring, but if you- if an agency says 

this specific issue is a monitoring issue, but in our 

minds they're non-compliant with our standards, that 

kicks in the enforcement timeline. That's really the only 

way to track it.

DR. KING: Okay. It becomes, as I 

said, more problematic when we get into the language in 

602.23, I still think it's overly- I think it's overly 

broad. And I think you're capturing things that you 

probably don't mean to capture in that language.

MR. BOUNDS: I don't know. I think 

that, again, I think it, tied into the regulation, makesI mean, I think it makes sense if it's not- if it doesn't 

start an enforcement timeline, I don't- we don't- we 

still don't understand why an agency then- if it's not 
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serious enough to say you're non-compliant, then the 

enforcement timelines again would not, you know, would 

not start.

DR. KING: Agencies have different, I 

guess, different thresholds for non-compliance is what 

I'm saying. So I- you know, I stand by what I said 

before. I mean, you're essentiallyMS. K. SMITH: 30 seconds.

DR. KING: You're essentially 

requiring that an agency would change its nomenclature to 

adhere to something like this. And so, I mean, that's 

fine. But I think it's just something that you need to be 

aware of.

MR. ROBERTS: Thank you. Barmak, 

timing of comment, roughly chronological?

MR. NASSIRIAN: It's actually before 

this section we're talking about.

MR. BOUNDS: That's good. Yeah, I'm 

good. Go ahead.

MR. NASSIRIAN: And you don't have to 

even move the page because it's the provision before (m) 

as in Mary, (m)(2) specifically. A couple of quick 

questions. Are the criteria being listed here, the 

requirements being listed here, a snapshot requirement at 

the point of approval, or does the accreditor have an 
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obligation to continue to monitor each of these criteria 

over time?

MR. BOUNDS: I think it would- if that 

question's to me, I think it would be both. I mean, you 

want to- you definitely want to do that at the point 

where the written arrangement- where they enter into 

written arrangement and I think as part of an accreditors 

normal, you know, review processes, they will continue to 

look at these things.

MR. NASSIRIAN: So let me give you a 

not hypothetical example. Suppose there was an OPM that 

was flying high five years ago, shares trading at $96 per 

share. And today the shares are trading at $0.42 per 

share. And it has a going concern annotation in its 

financial statements. I would say that is just about as

illustrative of significant concerns about that entity 

having adequate financial resources to deliver on 

promises it might have made five years ago. I don't know 

any accreditor that has taken any such action, having 

approved that ineligible entity to get into the higher ed 

business by renting their logo and their Title IV 

eligibility. And that's- you know, when people talk about 

these are not just essays. And when we object that most 

of these are sort of idealized statements that are 

honored only in the breach, to me, that is illustrative 
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of where the problem is, that statements are made and 

commitments are recorded that are never enforced, even in 

the face of overwhelming evidence that really there is 

there- you know, we are about to see the collapse of an

entity that is hiding behind the brand names of some of 

our finest institutions in this country, and heaven only 

knows how many tens of thousands of students will be left 

holding the bag. I'll let people guess what that OPMthat not-so-fictitious OPM may be named.

MR. ROBERTS: Any other comments 

moving down the document? Yeah, Jamie, go ahead. You're 

muted Jamie, I'm sorry.

MS. STUDLEY: So you didn't hear me 

say, oh, damn, about being muted. I just want to 

underscore what Herman said. The answer to that question 

lies in (m)(3). Getting a little blurry here, but once 

the review has gone through, it is the obligation of the 

institution to satisfy the accreditor's standards and the 

accreditor's obligation to assure that they do. We- if 

there are gaps in that, it is with- it is at the point of 

the institution, not the agents that it chooses, that it 

is getting the work, the results that it wants. And I'm 

not speaking to any specific examples. What we're doing 

is creating a structure, and then we can go after anybody 

who doesn't carry out their responsibility. And where- 
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and if there are shortcomings in what the institution is 

delivering, that's the right way to look at it. It's not 

to go back and directly look at the third party. It's to 

look the institution in the eyes. But three is the answer 

to how- where that responsibility for meeting standards 

continuously operates.

MR. ROBERTS: Scott, go ahead.

MR. DOLAN: I just want to make sure 

I'm on the right page here, but I continue to have 

questions and concerns about the rationale and the 

context for the change to language around the requirement 

of additional site visits. And it would be helpful based 

on the proposal that we put forth to have a bit more 

clarity on- and I and I realize I'm asking this with, 

whatever, 3.5 hours, 2.5 hours left to go. But what'swhat is the rationale for a required site visit? What 

problems has the Department seen that requires this 

change? And that's- I'll stop there.

MR. BOUNDS: Yeah, I'll comment. I 

just want to make sure we- we're finished with the 

previous questions more related to the written 

arrangements. And then I'm happy to talk a little bit 

about- I'm assuming now we would be down in paragraph 

(e). So I'll start there then if there were no- so we 

just believe that it is important that site visits be 
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conducted to as many additional locations as possible. 

You know, we heard comments from the previous sessions, 

and we tried to come back with some language to try to 

fit the middle ground. Now, I can't give you any- I can 

give you anecdotal evidence based on complaints that we 

have gotten in about institutions and in some cases, the 

complaints were about- were related to, you know, 

locations that the agency had reviewed or conducted site 

visits to. We've had some of those same types of 

complaints with clinical sites in some cases where the 

agency had not been out to that clinical site. Again, we 

just think it's important that during an accreditation 

cycle that an agency conducts site visits to as many 

additional locations as possible. And again, here we 

started with 25 because our research when we have- we- I 

think we got some data from FSA that said, most of themost institutions have fewer than 25 locations. I think 

Donna's on. She can come in and jump in if I got that 

number- if I got that information incorrect. But that's 

where we came up with the 25 such locations. And we're 

giving options here if things occur where an agency is 

not able to visit all those locations. So we think this 

language here is kind of a compromise position that still 

will require visits to, you know, more additional 

locations. And we also say that if you don't get to- you 
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know, if you don't review all those additional locations 

in the next accreditation cycle, you then have to go back 

and review a set of locations different from the ones you 

reviewed in that previous cycle. So that's our rationale 

for adding this language.

MR. DOLAN: I guess one quick piece 

with that data that you've reviewed. Is that able to be 

shared in terms of that how that informed the number of 

25? The other thing, I- just in terms of a question, it 

would be helpful to hear the rationale around how the 

physical visit is going to help meet the different goals 

that are attached to the review. Right? Academic control, 

adequate faculty, facilities, resources, institution. 

Institution is financially stable. Institution has 

engaged in long-range planning for expansion. And again, 

I'll go back to some of the points I've made around you 

know, the success I think of virtual site visits in the 

past. And that's one. And the other piece of this is just 

a reminder that, who is going to be conducting these site 

visits, right? Those are volunteers from institutions who 

will have to kind of leave more often than not, their day 

jobs to carry these tasks and responsibilities out. And I 

understand, you know, it's not the only criteria, but I 

think we talk about risk, cost-benefit analysis here, I 

think is an important component of the work that we need 
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to do. And without a stronger rationale for the purpose 

and the data that's motivating it, I'm not clear around 

whether that benefit outweighs the costs.

MR. ROBERTS: Okay. Thank you, Scott. 

Jillian, go ahead.

MS. KLEIN: Yeah, I just have- I'm 

sorry, I have sort of a dumb question on page 29, so I 

just want to make sure I'm reading this correctly. So new 

(d) is speaking to instances where the school is not yet 

approved for Title IV and this would be in process to be 

eligible for Title IV. And then (e) is speaking to 

presumably eligible Title IV students or institutions, 

or, I suppose not, right, that are going through the 

accreditation cycle? Is that- am I understanding that 

correctly in terms of what the two different scenarios 

apply to?

MR. BOUNDS: Okay. I'm trying to 

follow you here. So you'reMS. KLEIN: On 29, on page 29- 

MR. BOUNDS: Okay.

MS. KLEIN: -(d) that starts with if 

the agency's accreditation of an institution enables the 

institution to seek eligibility. So I just want to be 

clear that section is applying just in cases where the 

institution is not yet eligible for Title IV, but they're 
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going through the process of becoming eligible for Title 

IV. Is that accurate?

MR. BOUNDS: If the agency's 

accreditation enables the institution to seek 

eligibility. Okay?

MS. KLEIN: Okay. I just want to make 

sure I was reading it right, that in terms of the two 

different sort of thresholds and parameters for requiring 

additional location visits, that the first- that new (d) 

is talking about instances where a school is intending to 

be, or is planning to apply for Title IV eligibility, and 

then new (e) is instances where an institution is going 

through each accreditation cycle.

MR. BOUNDS: No, no. That means if the 

agency is already a Title IV gatekeeper.

MS. KLEIN: Okay, so then I think I'm 

more confused by that answer because I'm- and I'm sorry 

if I'm the only one who doesn't get this. You guys have 

like, you know, the end of the day on the last day, but 

so can you explain, I guess, how the- how- I'm confused 

about how (d) and (e) work together I guess. Because I'm 

reading in (d), has a total of three or fewer physical 

locations, but then (e) uses this 25 location number. If 

I'm the only one who doesn't understand this and we can 

move on and I trust you all but this seems- I- just 
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seems- Donna, help me.

MS. MANGOLD: Sorry, (d) is really 

focusing on when an institution seeks to add an 

additional location, the approval of that initial 

additional location, it has to- the agency standards have 

to include those items. (c) is on- or (e) is ongoing 

visits to existing additional locations.

MS. KLEIN: Got it. Now that you say 

it that way, I see that. For whatever reason, it doesn't 

read- it didn't- it hasn't read that clearly to me. So I 

don't know if there's a way to make it clearer, it might 

be helpful.

MS. MANGOLD: I think part of the 

problem also, which I just noticed, is the existing 

language that says to seek eligibility to participate in. 

So that's a- that's not good language right there and we 

can probably fix that.

MS. KLEIN: Okay. Thank you for 

humoring me.

MR. ROBERTS: Glad we cleared it up. 

Any other- we're, I think almost at the end of this 

section by my account. Any other comments? Feedback? Oh, 

sorry, did I interrupt someone?

MR. BOUNDS: I have one thing to point 

out to [inaudible]
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Negotiated Rulemaking Program Integrity and 

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MR. ROBERTS: Go ahead, Herman. And 

then I see Jamie [inaudible]. Herman, you go ahead.

MR. BOUNDS: Yeah. So I want to- I 

want to look under 602.24 (b). If we can go back up to 

that because it wasn't- yeah, 602.24 Bravo, (b).

MR. ROBERTS: 24 (b)?

MR. BOUNDS: 24, yeah. 24 Bravo, 24 

(b), yeah.

MR. ROBERTS: I have it on page 34, to 

the document sharer.

MR. BOUNDS: Okay, let me get down 

there myself.

JOE: I'm sorry one more time, 602, 

24?

MR. ROBERTS: 34, I think I misspoke. 

Apologies.

JOE: Page 34. Thank you.

MR. BOUNDS: Yeah. Did I write it 

down?

MR. ROBERTS: Yep. Right there.

MR. BOUNDS: I think I'm- I think I'm 

a little lost. Maybe it's- well, let me make sure. Should 

be- yeah. Hold on. I am in the wrong place. Give me- just 

give me one second, guys, I got so much open.

MS. STUDLEY: We sympathize with 
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finding your place in these regulations. I bet we could 

get consensus that it's not easy.

MR. BOUNDS: I hate to slow up the 

process.

MR. ROBERTS: That's okay. I don't 

think we quite reached 23 (b) yet, but it does pertain to 

site visits, which I know was something that folks had 

raised. So if we're talking 22 (b)- 

MR. BOUNDS: Maybe, yeah. Let me go 

back up. I probably wrote down the wrong- so let me- I 

just want to make sure I'm in the right- because I did 

want to point one thing out to you all. Maybe I'm in the 

wrong place.

MR. ROBERTS: 22 (b) is on page 25, 

26. My ordering got messed up, 27, it's the bottom of 27.

VANESSA: Poor Brady has gotten 

constant messages from me asking him what page we were 

on, as have a lot ofMR. ROBERTS: Yeah, be careful what 

you wish for. Yeah, you're getting a live update. Yeah.

VANESSA: If he doesn't answer 

immediately, I just send it to the group. What page are 

we on?

MR. BOUNDS: Yeah, I'd say, well, 

let's continue on now. I will- when I- 
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Negotiated Rulemaking Program Integrity and 

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MR. ROBERTS: We can circle back. 

Jamie, I know that you had yourMR. BOUNDS: We'll circle back.

MR. ROBERTS: You had your hand up. 

Yeah, go ahead.

MS. STUDLEY: Yeah. And thank you, it 

keeps dropping. Scott made an important point. I think 

this is one of the hardest to understand what the problem 

is that we're trying to address, because we do need to go 

to places where we can learn something that's important, 

or to have institutions know that we're prepared to, or 

spot check or alert to issues at campuses. I appreciate 

the effort to move, but without knowing the why, it's- it 

was very hard to develop alternative language. I tried, 

but I'll tell you some of the questions that came up. The 

tests should not be as many as possible. It should be how 

many are needed to carry out our responsibilities and 

make sure that institutions are operating their 

additional and branch locations successfully. So 25 may 

be a common number of branches, but it doesn't 

necessarily mean that we need to use the not unlimited 

resource of peer evaluator time or staff time, if that's 

allowable for this purpose to do these visits, that there 

is a limit to, to that resource. I'll also reiterate that 

the institutional level issues that are listed there, you 
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really don't necessarily go to the employer site location 

or the branch in Hanoi or Paris to figure out whether the 

institution is doing effective long-range planning or has 

the governance that's needed, or a curriculum that it 

offers in a variety of different places. Many of those 

can be done centrally. I'm sympathetic to Herman saying 

that there are complaints to agencies that sometimes tell 

us that there's a problem with either one or potentially 

a system of branch and additional locations. We'd be 

happy to follow up on them. But as I say, when I tried to 

craft an alternative I would throw out things like, is it 

necessary to be required to visit every high school and 

middle school where there is an additional location? 

Seemed to me that might be simple. Somebody said, no, 

they're often the ones that you most need to visit. Every 

time an institution has an additional location at a 

community college, which, based on my look, is a very 

common reason for some institutions to offer their 

program there. I said, what if accredited community 

colleges, wouldn't they know whether they were getting 

what they expected from the additional location at their 

college? Does a complaint? What kind of complaint? What 

kind of adjudicated complaint might warrant us to be 

required to visit? And the answers- and there were good 

answers to why some of these were both overbroad or 
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inadequate. What it led to was where we were when we 

started, accrediting agencies determine when to do it, 

and we get held to [30 seconds] that we will do it 

thoroughly and successfully. We are not claiming to be 

perfect, but having us run around to all 25 locations of 

a very healthy institution, rather than focusing on the 

places where there are issues or improving systems if 

they are deficient is just a better use of the time. And 

I would point out in the triggers, and I appreciate the 

addition of triggers, we're talking 13-year-old 

sanctions. If you talk about a full- for me that would be 

the minimum is plus three years. For some, it's ten plus 

three years. You're talking about visiting every location 

for a school that was on warning 13 years ago 

potentially. 

MR. ROBERTS: Thank you. Was there any 

immediate response from the Department? And Jamie, I 

know, did you did you have anything additional? Okay.

MR. BOUNDS: We would just welcome any 

other suggestions.

MR. ROBERTS: Yeah.

MR. BOUNDS: I did find the place 

where I wanted to go. It's it is 602.24 (b) and it's on 

page 34. And its old language, but we meant to add some 

additional language there. So under (b) where we have the 
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agency may determine the appropriate composition of the 

evaluation body for site- for these site visits, except 

that the evaluation body must include we have educators 

and if appropriate, practitioners. We meant to add in 

there academics, educators, and if appropriate, 

practitioners. And the reason for that, and the reason 

for that is under 602.15 (a)(3). The composition of the 

decision-making body for an institutional accrediting 

agency only requires academics and administrators. So we 

didn't feel it was right here to now require 

institutional accrediting agencies to use the term 

educator.

MR. ROBERTS: Jamie, do you want to 

respond to that?

MS. STUDLEY: [Inaudible] question 

since we are jumping around. That is the appropriate body 

for a site visit following a change of ownership or 

control. Is that right? It's not saying that you have to 

have, that that's the way a site visit has to be done on 

the- if it were to become law, the routine every 

reaffirmation cycle visits.

MR. BOUNDS: No, every reaffirmation 

cycle would remain to be managed under 602.15. This is 

just specific when it comes toMS. STUDLEY: Teach outs.
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Negotiated Rulemaking Program Integrity and 

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MR. BOUNDS: Yeah.

MS. STUDLEY: I'm sorry, not teach 

outs, for change of ownership.

MR. BOUNDS: Change of ownership. 

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And again, we thought we needed to- I 

thought I needed to say that because we're introducing 

educators in here and it's not required for institutional 

credit agencies in a normal circumstance. You can have 

anybody else you want, but we're saying that those three, 

it should be their practitioners, if appropriate.

MR. ROBERTS: Okay. Thank you both. 

Because we have jumped ahead just a little bit. Do you 

want to just walk us through- do you want to go back and 

do 602.23?

MR. BOUNDS: Yeah, and I'm sorry if I 

did that. My brain just- it's- I did not- did not mean to 

do that. I got a little discombobulated there. Yeah. 

Didn't mean to do that. Alright. So we'll go back to. 

Yeah, we can go back to 23. I think we're done with 22. 

So we will start with 602.23. And Brady, just keep me in 

line, man, if I do that again. Okay, so if we start under 

602.23 we have additional language starting on page 31. 

And this is really related to public display of 

information. So we added except that the agent must 

redact any information received from institution or third 
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parties that it may designate under 631 (f) for 

submission to the Department. Again, this is under B 

which is where we- where we're requiring agencies to post 

all materials included in their application for initial 

or renewal of recognition. We made another change above 

that too, we- I think we had 60 days, and now we're 

saying 90 days. If we go down to (c), we have some 

additional language there which talks about including the 

opportunity for comment from the institutions, faculty, 

staff, and students when the institution proposes 

changing accrediting agencies. That's new language. And 

under (d), which is basically we're talking about review 

of complaints. We've added language for that. The 

complaint did not first submit the complaint to the 

institutional program and allow the institutional program 

to reach a conclusion. And I think everything else under 

complaints we struck out for. And then two, we have 

additional language there, including agency's processes 

for minor complaints, including anonymous complaints 

received to identify patterns of systematic 

noncompliance. So we've added language here. And will we 

go to (e). Some additional language under (e). And again 

here we referenced, again we referenced 602.20 (a) and 

(b), again, because of the many different statuses thator nomenclature that agencies use to identify you know, 
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non-compliant situations. And let's seeMR. ROBERTS: Looks like there's one 

change under (f), and that's the end of that section.

MR. BOUNDS: Yeah. Yeah. One change 

under (f), ensuring that an institution or program 

subject to a probation or equivalent status and adverse 

action, or any action that initiates the enforcement 

timelines, notifies the students- and if you scan downof the status in a prominent manner and required the 

notices to include the reasons for the consequence of any 

timeline associated with the action.

MR. ROBERTS: Okay. Ready to take 

comments and feedback, Herman?

MR. BOUNDS: Yep. I'm ready to do it.

MR. ROBERTS: Alright, we've got 

Erika, who's rejoining the table on behalf of private 

nonprofits, who's hand is up. So take it away, Erika.

MS. LINDEN: Thank you. And I will 

share with all, accreditation is not an area that I knew 

very much about before this, and I'm still in a learning 

curve. So my question may be very naive, but I- in 

section- on page 31, 602.23 (b) about posting all 

materials included with an application for initial or 

renewal of recognition. And one of the accreditors that 

we work with had just shared with me a thought that if 
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they're talking about initial working documents that are 

really not intended to be an accurate picture, they are 

really just working documents early in the review 

process, that posting those, is that what's- is that part 

of what all means? And if so, just- no? Okay.

MR. BOUNDS: No. Good. I didn't mean 

to cut you off so go ahead.

MS. LINDEN: No, that solves that.

MR. BOUNDS: Okay. So what we're 

talking about here is what the agency submits to us in 

their initial application. So they submit their initial 

application on our end. We would call that, you know, 

their submission. And then we would complete a draft 

after that. So it's not- if I'm understanding correctly, 

it's not, you know, kind of their initial write-up or, 

you know, things that their, you know, processes or some 

of those initial conversations and writings that they do 

as part of this. What we're asking them to post is once 

they submit it to us and then all of the supporting 

documentation associated with that initial submission.

MS. LINDEN: Thank you. And if I could 

just ask a second question or share a second point. On 

the issue of complaints and the time submission, you 

know, I'm- in my real life, I'm a compliance officer, and 

I do sometimes have to deal with old complaints and just 
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an observation, that it becomes problematic the long- the 

older it is to have reliable information, because 

sometimes there's change of personnel or documentation is 

not present because it wasn't collected at the time, 

because there wasn't a concern about there being a 

complaint at the time. So I just offer that as, you know, 

we do the best we can when we have to go back and look at 

old things, but it becomes even harder to resolve the 

older it is. So just a comment on those five- on 

expanding to five years. Thank you.

MR. ROBERTS: Okay. Thank you, Erika. 

Jamie just let me know that Michael will be coming in for 

institutional accreditors. But first, I think we have 

Laura's hand up. Go ahead, Laura.

DR. KING: Thank you. So back to back 

to my point that I made earlier. This is- there's a big 

change in (e) in terms of what- when an enforcement 

timeline is triggered as it would be in 602.20 (a) or 

(b). The institution has time. It has a year, two years, 

whatever its particular timeframe is to come into 

compliance. This is a big change that it's requiring 

notification of the public and students and everybody 

whenever that is triggered. We already have requirements 

for notification when probation, for example, is 

triggered or obviously revocation, denial, something like 
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that. But whenever there's- but it's a very big change to 

say that whenever there's any compliance issue noted in 

an accreditation review, when they have- when the 

institution does have time to come into compliance, that 

everybody has to be notified about that. That's a huge 

change. And I don't think it's- I don't think it's fair 

to- I don't think it's fair to institutions. I think it's 

confusing for students. I think it's a huge change and 

very problematic.

MR. ROBERTS: Doesn't look like the 

Department is immediately ready to respond.

MR. BOUNDS: I was going to wait. 

Yeah, I was just going to wait in case someone 

[inaudible] responses.

MR. ROBERTS: Laura, did you- did you 

have an additional commentary to offer?

DR. KING: Sorry, did I?

MR. ROBERTS: Yeah.

DR. KING: No, I mean that was my 

commentary. I made it as well where this relates to other 

sections, but it's particularly problematic here because 

it triggers notice requirements, which I don't think is 

in the best interest of anybody, in this particular case. 

Those are- those compliance issues, they have a timeline 

to come into compliance. As long as they come into 
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compliance, they're fine. The accreditor has not deemed 

that the institution is in danger of losing its 

accreditation over these things. They are just things 

that need to be fixed. And if the institution fixes them 

in the allowable amount of time that the regulations 

allow, then that should be sufficient. I think it's 

confusing to everybody to go out and try to, you know, 

notify folks about all of those instances that happen.

MR. ROBERTS: Okay. Thank you. Oh, go 

ahead, Herman, if you wanted to respond.

MR. BOUNDS: No, I was going to say, I 

can resp- I mean, I can respond individually. I just- I 

was trying to wait to see if anyone else had a comment 

related to what Laura is talking about under two on page 

32. And I was just going to respond in general.

MR. ROBERTS: We can take Michale's 

comment first. Go ahead.

MR. MCCOMIS: Thank you. Yeah, my 

comment is really under 602.23. And the requirement for

agencies to post the petitions for rerecognition and all 

of the accompanying materials that go along with that. 

And I just want to give some context to that. You know, 

it's- having just, you know, recently gone through a 

process. We have hundreds of exhibits that support a 

petition for rerecognition. They have significant what 
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would otherwise be considered confidential information 

for the institutions. And while, you know, there are 

opportunities for redaction of PII and for opportunities 

to exempt certain information, you know, to require 

private agencies going through this process voluntarily 

to, you know, put hundreds of documents up for public 

review, when we have a very capable Education 

Accreditation Division staff to review this information 

and we have an opportunity for the public to get it 

through a FOIA request, seems to me to be sufficient. 

There are protections that are built into FOIA for both 

institutions and for individuals. And these documents are 

so huge that these additional posting requirements can 

lead to mistakes, can lead to the disclosure of either 

publicly personally identifiable information or other 

information that would otherwise be confidential. So ifyou know, I have no issue with posting narratives of over 

100 narratives that are part of the petition process that 

go through these regulations and require a narrative 

response from institutions. But the hundreds of 

additional exhibits. So I would ask under 602.23 (b) that 

be recast to simply require the narrative portions of the 

petition. And if the Department won't go in that 

direction, then I would also ask that, that you allow for 

agencies to also- and, you know, if there are rules 
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otherwise determine something to be confidential, that 

that information can be marked as exempt as well.

MR. ROBERTS: Okay. Thank you, 

Michale. Herman, do you want to just take the remainder 

of the comments, then sort of respond in general to the 

points you've heard?

MR. BOUNDS: Yeah. I just want to go 

back to, you know, to Laura's comment. I didn't want to 

make her wait, you know, wait for a response. You know, 

one thing here, we do think it- we do think it's 

important, again, if it's a- if it's something that 

initiates the enforcement timelines, then we think that, 

you know, we think that should be reported. And the way 

that the regulations are written now, it talks about 

probation or equivalent status, and that can leave outthat could leave out situations that could indicate a 

significant non-compliant issue. Plus, in two, we're also 

saying that the institution includes the reason for theyou know, for the notification. So if it is something 

minor, you know, students, or folks at the institution 

can see that and they can evaluate, you know, they can 

evaluate that. So again, we just think it's important 

that, you know, if there's an action taken that starts 

that enforcement timeline, then that could be at some 

point detrimental because then if the agency doesn't, I 
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mean, excuse me, if the institution doesn't demonstrate 

compliance, then further action needs to be taken. We 

just think that making people aware of that at an early 

point is important. We definitely think it's important 

for students to know.

MR. ROBERTS: Thank you. I'll take 

Barmak and then Carolyn. But, Barmak, go ahead.

MR. NASSIRIAN: Addressing Michael's 

point, I think he used the word agencies are voluntarily 

submitting themselves to this process. He's right. It's a 

voluntary process. If you don't want to be federally 

recognized, you would be relieved of all of these 

obligations. There is no state police power being 

deployed here. This is essentially an application for the 

privilege of serving as a recognized, you know, 

accreditor. Then the burden associated with those kinds 

of disclosures and with transparency in general are real. 

I certainly do not debate that, but I want my accreditor 

friends to also be cognizant of the opacity of the 

process. This is an extraordinarily opaque process. And 

people are willing to trust a black box as long as it 

works. So if accreditation worked and we didn't have the 

torrent of abuse that we have witnessed, I know all of 

them are ten years or older, but, you know, there's 

plenty of evidence that as this committee is 
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deliberating, there are vets being enrolled in lousy 

programs enjoying full accreditation. I would bet my life 

on that proposition. Okay, so given the fact that 

accreditation is at contrary to the satisfaction that the 

institutions and accreditors seem to enjoy with the 

process and with the outcomes that they generate, the 

public and certainly students are not- have lost faith in 

accreditation because on the ground, it is actually not 

doing what it's supposed to be doing. It is supposed to 

weed out the worst actors. Don't point to me at how many 

airplanes took off at national airport with no incidents, 

because one airplane having a problem should sound the 

alarm. And here we have airplanes crashing on a daily 

basis when it comes to institutional accreditation. And 

everybody is saying, don't look over here, look over 

there, look at the good ones. Don't mind the bad ones. 

There are a few bad apples, a few bad apples. They're 

generating a lot of hardship. It just breaks my heart 

when I hear veterans being robbed of their GI benefits, 

all of their GI benefits, plus being forced into debt by 

entities that then proudly indicate their full 

accreditation status to the next victim. So, you know, 

yeah, we want to know what abracadabra is going on the 

inside that somehow satisfies the procedural requirements 

and yet generates these terrible outcomes.
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MR. ROBERTS: Alright. Carolyn.

MS. FAST: And Barmak said a lot of 

what I wanted to say about the need for these changes. I 

agree with what he just said about the problems that we 

see in the accreditation system. More specifically, I 

wanted to respond to the comments about the Department's 

proposal that during the recognition process, accreditors 

be required to post publicly the documentation that they 

have submitted to the Department. I think this is 

extremely important, and I strongly support the 

Department's proposal here because it helps make sure 

that the public actually can participate and understand 

what's happening in the recognition process, which 

otherwise they cannot. The fact that something is 

available through a FOIA request is not helpful in this 

case, because of the timing of the situation. The FOIA 

request takes too long to be meaningful as a mechanism 

for obtaining public availability of the document. 

Especially because the comments on recognition process 

are due so far in advance of the actual meeting. Also, 

agencies are already required to review the documents 

that they're sending to the Department for any potential 

need for redactions under FOIA. So this doesn't really 

add to the burden as much as codify the existing burden 

and make it easier for outside the public and outside 
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observers to understand what's actually happening with 

the recognition process and to meaningfully contribute to 

commenting on this.

MR. ROBERTS: Alright, Erika, I see 

your hand next.

MS. LINDEN: Yes, I'll be brief. Onin the middle of this page that is up. Oh, no, it got 

moved. Could you go to page 32? The middle of page 32. 

Stop there please. Are there two parenthetical twos here? 

One beginning with adequately and one beginning with 

review?

MR. BOUNDS: Let's see. Where are we 

at here. On page 32? 

MS. LINDEN: Right. So page 32, which 

isMR. ROBERTS: Yeah. There's a- there 

does seem to be a numbering error.

MR. BOUNDS: Yeah, there is a 

numbering error. Yeah.

MS. LINDEN: Thank you. Just want to 

make sure one of those wasn't meant to be deleted. Thank 

you.

MR. ROBERTS: Alright, Jamie, go 

ahead.

MS. STUDLEY: It breaks my heart too. 
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I listen to the public comment with exactly the same 

concern for those students that you have. The question is 

not whether we need to improve. All of the players in 

this process need to improve. The question is how. We're 

talking about ways to get to better results that put our 

focus, our resources, our volunteers in the right places. 

So we didn't object, for example, to additional location 

visits where there is a problem, where there is an issue, 

but we think we shouldn't be distracted from doing that. 

We sincerely mean to improve the system and my 

observation is that accreditors are doing better, faster, 

stricter. The Department acknowledged that they didn't 

have numbers about how long it takes to come to a 

conclusive withdrawal or sanction. I think that would 

help us. We are doing everything- we are agreeing to a 

whole lot of the things that the Department and advocates 

understand or believe that would help us both open that 

black box. Because I agree it is not sufficiently well 

understood. And also allow agencies the room to decide 

where their resources can best be placed to accomplish 

this and to be held to task for the results. Many of 

these provisions do that effectively. NACIQI and the 

Department are working on all of those. But distracting 

us with things that are not helpful only takes away from 

the momentum that's going on in those directions. So I'm- 
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you know, Carolyn and Barmak's point about helping people 

understand what's going on is well taken. The petition 

and the narrative from the agency would do that. But it's 

a fair point that the exchanges with institutions, the 

detailed documentation about every letter that we sent, 

every- examples of submissions to us from the 

institutions are- the risk and the burden outweighs the 

value to the public in the availability of those. I think 

the story that you're looking for is well told in the 

narrative and in the questions that can be asked from 

that, that hold us to task.

MR. ROBERTS: Alright. Thank you, all. 

Unless there are more comments on this section, it might 

be appropriate to move to the next area of the document, 

which I believe is 602.24. How are- do folks want a short 

break? The intent, obviously, is to keep going through 

this document for the remainder of the day. So I want to 

be cognizant of how- you know, the pace of conversation. 

Do we want to walk through this section, take a quick 

ten-minute break and then come back and pick up the 

discussion or do folks want to keep going?

MR. MARTIN: I think we should take a 

ten-minute break after Herman goes through this section.

MR. ROBERTS: Yeah, okay. Herman, take 

it away.
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DR. PRINCE: Can we- well, I put in 

the group if we could finish before taking a break. Let's 

finish the [inaudible 01:26:52]

MR. ROBERTS: Finish the discussion on 

602.24?

DR. PRINCE: Or the whole paper.

MR. ROBERTS: There were- there- I 

have been getting a few requests to take a short break, 

so I'm just- I'm trying to figure out the best place for 

all of you to entertain that process request.

MR. MARTIN: And as much as we're 

going to have to take a break, I think it makes sense to 

have Herman walk through this, then just- then take the 

break.

MR. ROBERTS: Yeah, yeah, just to have 

folks prepare their comments and stuff. Yeah. Okay.

MR. BOUNDS: Alright. So we're going 

to start on 24. I think I said this before again we made 

updates and changes here you know, based on previous 

comments. So I'll try to stay in order this time as we go 

through. I think we're now on page 34. Is that right?

MR. ROBERTS: Yep, I have- yeah, the 

changes start on page 34.

MR. BOUNDS: Yeah, changes start on 

page 34. Under (c) teach out plans and agreements. 
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We made a change there based on comments. I don't know if 

we're sharing a document yet.

MR. ROBERTS: Would you mind resharing 

the document? Our screen sharer may have stepped away.

MR. BOUNDS: Okay. Do we want to? I 

don't want folks to be confused, so I don't know if you 

want to go through it without it being shared.

MR. ROBERTS: I think maybe run 

through the changes and then once you pick back, once we 

resume, we can probably have the screen sharing figured 

out.

MR. BOUNDS: Greg, are you good withyeah. I just want to make- okay. 

MR. MARTIN: Yeah, I'm not sure if 

Joe's out there or.

MR. BOUNDS: Okay.

JOE: Somehow it froze up. I think 

I'm- I think I'm back. Can you hear me?

MR. MARTIN: Oh, we got you, Joe. 

Yeah, we can hear you now, Joe.

MR. BOUNDS: Alright, there we go.

MR. ROBERTS: And if you- if you're 

able to Joe, just on page 34 is where the changes begin. 

Yep. Perfect. Thank you.

MR. BOUNDS: Alright. We'll get 
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started here. This is a pretty large session. So we'll go 

through one by one. Under (c), teach out plans and 

agreements, we took some suggestions here and removed 

renewal. So it's only applicable to initial 

accreditation. Under two, we have some highlighted 

language there. Agencies are required to submit updates 

of its existing teach out plans, again as required under 

602 and annually until the issue is resolved. Under 

romanette two, I've added some language here. The agency 

accepts to place the institution of- the agency acts, 

excuse me, to place the institution or program on 

probation or equivalent status, or takes any other formal 

action against the institution related to its financial 

condition. Where are we at now? I think we're down to, 

yeah, page 35. Has some additional language under six. 

Nothing too significant there. I won't read that to you 

all. Then we get down to page 36. Language changes under 

(i). And here this is- you know, we basically think that 

there's some stability there and good experience for 

adding the two-year requirement- has operated such 

program for at least two years. So we will continue down. 

Just a correction there of where information is located. 

The last item on page 36. And then if we go down to page 

37, there are some significant changes under transfer of 

credit. Again, a lot of these came from committee 
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comments and suggestions.

MR. ROBERTS: I believe, Herman, the 

last change in this section relates to subsection (e), 

transfer of credit policy. Is there anything else? 

MR. BOUNDS: Yeah, yeah I think that's 

it in this- that's it in this section. I'm not going to 

read that all to everybody. Folks can see that. And then 

we can have discussion on it when we get back.

MR. ROBERTS: Alright. Thank you all. 

For your indulgence on that, let's take a ten-minute 

break. Feel free to begin queuing now. You can hold your 

place if you know you've got a comment or a suggestion or 

new proposal. But we will pick back up live at 2:37 

Eastern. Welcome back, everyone. Hope you enjoyed that 

short break. It's my understanding, Herman, you wanted to 

make a brief clarification before we solicit Jo and 

Jillian's comments.

MR. BOUNDS: Yeah, and okay so this is 

really going to- we're going to the discussion, real 

quick discussion we had under 602.22 and we're going to 

go to (e). And we would ask- we would- I would just ask 

Jamie and Scott maybe to put some language maybe in the 

chat about, you know, the site visits to additional 

locations. The other point I want to make, and Donna, you 

jump in if I forget something here, is that we're going 
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to move to the beginning of (e), bring down Title IV 

eligibility. So that may further indicate that you 

wouldn't have to look at additional locations that 

weren't Title IV eligible.

MR. ROBERTS: That's pages 29 and 30, 

were those.

MR. BOUNDS: Yeah, 29. Yeah.

MR. ROBERTS: Gotcha.

MR. BOUNDS: Yeah, yeah. So we're 

going to ask Jamie and Scott if they have some language 

there that they want to submit. And then under (e) just 

before, you know, just the agency must have effective 

mechanisms. We're just going to bring down the Title IV 

eligibility there, so that we just alert people that the 

additional locations, they wouldn't have to look at 

anything that wasn't a Title IV eligible physical 

location. Donna, did I get everything there?

MS. MANGOLD: Yeah, we just noticed 

that we also have to flip the additional physical- it 

says additional physical location. We're going to flip it 

to physical additional locations to make it consistent 

with what we did in the other provision.

MR. ROBERTS: Alright. Thank you both. 

Jamie, did you want to-. 

MS. STUDLEY: Yeah.
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MR. ROBERTS: Yeah, go ahead.

MS. STUDLEY: Can I follow- can I 

follow up on that? I think if this were- and I mean, no 

disrespect to the process, but this- if this were a game 

show, I'd be looking for a lifeline. One dilemma I have 

is that I do not- I am not familiar enough with dual 

enrollment programs because I don't accredit community 

colleges and I don't know the scope of it with my 

institutions. So I don't know whether there- whether that 

would- how that would relate, if at all, to high school. 

Jo may know more about this, but I don't know whether 

that would mean that high schools and middle schools did 

not need to be visited. And I got the question, I mean, 

that may be an appropriate line for you to draw. It's not 

exactly the same as the one I mentioned asking about. But 

how much that would change the obligation is just not 

something that I happen to know well, because I don't 

know the relationship of Title IV to dual enrollment 

students.

MR. BOUNDS: I [inaudible] think Donna 

to [inaudible]

MS. STUDLEY: To the extent that would 

answer the question about the expense and relevance of 

visiting international additional locations and branch 

locations. While we would miss the expanded requirement 
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to travel to all parts of the world, that to me sounds 

like a reasonable- a helpful improvement in that regard.

MR. BOUNDS: Yeah. And Jamie, I can 

answer the part about international since those things 

are not covered and your activity overseas are not 

covered in a recognition process, that definitely would 

not be included- would not be included here. 

MS. STUDLEY: I'm agreeing. That 

wouldMR. BOUNDS: Okay, yeah.

MS. STUDLEY: That was one of the 

places where expense without apparent need, we would 

visit them if we thought it went to the institution's 

quality ability, but not be required to. I think that's 

helpful. I'm just hoping that somebody else on the call 

knows more aboutMR. ROBERTS: I was going to say, Jo- 

[Inaudible]

MS. BLONDIN: And I'm not trying to 

get ahead in my next comment, but I would say that I 

mean, most high schools, I mean, the students are not 

Title IV eligible. However, in that pilot project that 

took place several years ago with high school Pell, 

which- but I would also say that there are visits 

occasionally if 50% or more of a degree program is 
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offered at that high school. However, they're not Title 

IV eligible. But we have had some visits to our programs, 

so, but I- yeah, my understanding is from my alternate at 

Middle States, they have no visits to high schools.

MR. ROBERTS: Thank you both. Any 

other additional comments on this section? Seeing none. I 

think we can jump back to- I think the first changes are 

on page 34. That's 602.24. My order might have gotten 

juggled a little bit, but Jo, I had your hand up first 

for comments on this, and then we'll go to Jillian.

MS. BLONDIN: Okay, so I want to thank 

the Department for the inclusion of transfer in this 

section. You know too often for community colleges, there 

is an inequitable- or transfer policies are inequitable 

for our students. And so knowing that the quality of the 

education that takes place at community colleges is 

equivalent, this is very helpful for us. So I just want 

to say thank you on behalf of our students, as well as 

the faculty who teach those students. Thank you.

MR. ROBERTS: Thank you. Jillian, go 

ahead.

MS. KLEIN: Thanks. I just have a 

couple comments. So first, on page 34 on romanette two 

under section two where it talks about- and this might 

just be my own ignorance, so thanks again for bearing 
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with me. I don't know what the definition is of other 

formal action. Is that a definition that's codified 

somewhere, or can somebody just explain maybe what that 

means? Other formal action against institution?

MR. BOUNDS: Let me see where you are.

MS. KLEIN: Yep. Right, right, yep. 

You got it.

MR. BOUNDS: I think that would- you 

know, we're also talking about- I think when we say here 

other formal action against it is related to its 

finances, I would say that would probably have to do with 

some- with a status you know, issued by FSA, whether it's 

a, you know, whether it's a HCM2 or something, you know, 

something like that, something related to that.

MS. KLEIN: So that when it says, I'm 

sorry, where it says the agency, it's not talking about 

the accreditor? I guess what I think I heard you say is 

it's talking about a Department action. But I thought I 

was reading it as like the accreditor places the 

institution on probation.

MR. BOUNDS: On probation or 

equivalent status. Oh, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. 

You're right, you're right. My mistake. And in that case, 

I think it would, you know, in that case, I think it 

would mean any other action that an agency might take 
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related to finances. I think it would all point out- I 

think it would all point out to a non-compliant action. 

But that does look like it's a little confusing. So maybe 

we I mean, we could probably remove that.

MS. KLEIN: Okay, I would just- I 

guess I would just invite, of course, Jamie or whoever, 

Laura, if you want to chime in on this, I don't know. I 

don't- maybe you know what formal action means. I would 

just want to be clear about what that means for the 

agency and also what it means for institutions. So just 

flag that. And then under romanette three, you know, we 

had submitted language and would just encourage the 

Department again on the provisional certification to 

actually cite the reg which I think is 668.13 (c)(1), 

which is specific about what the actual triggers are for 

provisional. Just to highlight the comments that I made 

last session and I think maybe JoEllen did too, I might 

be misspeaking, about instances where we know the

Department has put institutions on provisional status 

largely due to, I think, a backlog of paperwork at the 

Department. So I would just strongly encourage the 

Department, especially since in the lower sections where 

it talks about like reimbursement, payment methods, and 

HCM, there's also language or regulatory citations down 

there about what exactly is being specified. I would just 
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strongly encourage the Department to actually cite to the 

provisional certification the regulatory citation.

MR. ROBERTS: And then, Jillian, it 

looks like you might have a response to that question. 

Did you want to- did you have more comments? I'm sorry to 

interrupt you.

MS. KLEIN: Oh, yeah. I just have one 

other comment.

MR. ROBERTS: Okay. Go ahead.

MS. KLEIN: Is that okay?

MR. ROBERTS: Yeah. Yeah.

MS. KLEIN: Okay. And then down on the 

transfer credit policy section on page 37, I made this 

comment last time as well, but I just feel like it's 

worth repeating since nothing has changed. Which is I'm 

all in favor, of course, of more disclosure of 

information to help transfer students understand what 

they might expect in institutions they're looking at. And 

I'm largely fine with most of the language here in terms 

of what needs to be included in sort of publicly 

disclosed information on transfer students. But I really 

feel like romanette one where it says the average time to 

completion for transfer students, no matter what, will be 

a really misleading piece of information for students, 

because we know that transfer students, there is no 
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average transfer student, right? We can come up with an 

average number, but in 99.9% of the cases, it will not be 

reflective of what that individual student's experience 

will be because they are bringing in a different number 

of transfer credits, or they will be moving at a 

different pace through their program. And so I feel like 

it's misleading to students to put a number out there 

that cites [30 seconds] Yep. The average time to complete 

for a transfer student when it will either overstate or 

understate the amount of time it will take that student, 

I feel like to the student's detriment. So I'm all about 

like, we can even throw more stuff on here about what to 

disclose to transfer students about their experience. But 

I feel like that's a really dangerous element to include 

just given my comments. Thanks.

MR. ROBERTS: Thank you. And then, 

Jamie, your hand was up. Did you want to respond to 

Jillian's question from earlier or did you have new 

comments? And you're muted right now, apologies. Jamie, 

you're muted right now. Hold on. We can come back to you. 

Scott.

MS. K. SMITH: There she is.

MS. STUDLEY: You didn't hear? What I 

said was- did you miss my comment?

MR. ROBERTS: We did, yeah, sorry.
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MS. STUDLEY: Formal action and 

provisional. So I'll step away and get in line.

MR. ROBERTS: Okay. Thank you. And I 

actually- I neglected to mention it earlier, but we have 

Scott come back to the table for private nonprofits, and 

his hand is up, so go ahead, Scott.

MR. DOLAN: I have a question about 

the additional locations piece, because I know there was 

some language- and I have a question about credit 

transfer, too. But there was some language introduced 

around international military bases. And I don't know if 

the Department would be open to language related to that. 

I know it was submitted previously, but not kind of 

incorporated. I don't know if you can answer that easily 

right now, but it's a question.

MR. BOUNDS: Yeah, I think- I think, 

Scott, maybe our last comment we addressed that because 

we don't- you know, any of the accrediting activities, 

you know, oversees, you know- unless I'm misunderstanding 

that question. We wouldn't include that in the additional 

locations that needed to be reviewed. 

MR. DOLAN: Okay. Do you- Jamie, do 

you have something to add there?

MS. STUDLEY: Yeah. One piece is 

following right up on international. I understand the 
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Department does not have a- an interest in the 

accreditation of an international institution.

MR. BOUNDS: Right. I got- yeah.

MS. STUDLEY: An institution of 

another country. But if a domestic institution has branch 

locations elsewhere, those students would be eligible for 

Title IV through their home base while studying. And I 

can tell you- you know, Hanoi, you know, locations all 

over the world. I believe that those are Title- those 

students are participating in Title IV while they are at 

the branch of their accredited institution.

MR. BOUNDS: Yeah, yeah. I think 

you're right.

MR. MARTIN: They are.

MR. BOUNDS: Yeah.

MS. STUDLEY: So I don't know how that 

relates to Scott's question about military, but they 

presumably would be eligible for both Title IV and VA, 

DOD, etc. benefits.

MR. BOUNDS: Yeah, thanks for that 

correction, Jamie. I agree.

MS. STUDLEY: So, okay- so back toMR. BOUNDS: We'll take that back.

MS. STUDLEY: - [inaudible] foreign 

countries.
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MR. ROBERTS: I see, Barmak, your hand 

is up next, so go ahead.

MR. NASSIRIAN: Yeah. I don't want to 

belabor the point, but first of all, a secretariallyrecognized accreditor engaging in accreditation 

activities internationally has consequences for the US 

higher education system. About 14, 15 years ago, a 

secretarially-recognized accreditor ended up accrediting, 

I believe it was called the American University for 

Humanities, AUH, in Tbilisi, Georgia. It was not a Title 

IV-participating institution, but the fact that a 

secretarially-recognized accreditor was rubber stamping, 

it gave it enormous credibility to engage in practices 

that many of us at the time viewed particularly in light 

of the past activities of its founders as just a de facto 

diploma mill. And the idea here is, why is the accreditor 

reaching so far out in places whose language it doesn't 

speak, where it has no local understanding? It's sort of 

like me taking a foreign delegation to Cambridge, showing 

them Harvard's buildings and saying, that's all mine. And 

they don't speak English. They don't know anything about 

ownership practices in the US. So it's a problem. And I 

just don't see any reason to exempt international 

locations, certainly just because they're international, 

even if we don't want to take into account the 
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credibility of the accreditor that rubber stamps entities 

outside the US, regardless of whether they're Title IV 

eligible or not. Certainly, in the case of Title IV 

eligible locations, either don't get involved overseas, 

or if you do have the resources to make sure the place 

exists, it has the adequate facilities, faculty, 

etcetera, etcetera. So I wouldn't give a pass just 

because it's expensive to go to Hanoi. If it's that 

expensive, don't do business in Hanoi.

MR. ROBERTS: Thank you, Barmak. 

Scott, go ahead.

MR. DOLAN: Yeah. And I- I've asked 

this question before, you know, around the policy 

statement around romanette two, credit transfer 

acceptance rates. One, how those are measured in a 

standardized way across institutions in a way that can 

actually work for a student who needs to make informed 

decisions. And I say that coming from an institution that 

does transfer as well as any institution in the country. 

So I just- I want to help students understand how they 

can get closer to a degree and how to recognize the 

learning that they've done, no matter where it has come 

from. I just don't think we have a- and maybe it's us for 

us to figure out. I just, you know, we're going to spend 

a lot of time trying to do it. And then the second part 
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of it around how we then apply those rates to general 

education versus the program of study when general 

education, again, varies pretty dramatically across 

institutions. So and I can understand, you know, the 

issues within a given system where that's the case and, 

you know, from a community college to a state agency that 

are all part of the same- you know, so I get all the 

issues and problems. I just don't know if the policy 

language is solving the issue. I think some more work 

needs to be done around, you know, what would be a really 

good approach here. And then the other one is around 

requiring an institution to provide an explanation for 

any institution from which it does not accept credits. So 

one, there's a whole universe of institutions that 

haven't presented credits to institutions. Again, I 

understand the intent. I don't think this language solves 

the problem. So, you know, I think the first few are 

getting us a little bit farther here, and then maybe 

underneath that, we can do a little more work to figure 

out the logistics and the practice in a way that really 

does work for students. I think we're going to confuse 

things for them. That's the- that's my concern.

MR. ROBERTS: Thank you, Scott. Jamie, 

go ahead. You're muted right now, Jamie.

MS. STUDLEY: My spacebar is not 
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working unmute, I apologize everybody. The transfer of 

credit area is one that is tremendously important to 

policymakers. The Department had a really good transfer 

of credit convening a few months ago. And WASC has been 

working with some of the leading people on- and who have 

an advisory group about transfer policy and research to 

try to think what we could do, including providing 

guidance to accreditors about how, even though we do not 

make the credit transfer decisions for an institution, 

how we can do things by asking about it and asking how 

well an institution does it with- because of our ability 

to drive student achievement results. That's the hook by 

which we are really connected to transfer. I think theScott put it well when he talked about the risk of 

confusion. The- and people's effort into creating numbers 

that won't tell people much when what they should be 

doing is evaluating their credit acceptance policies, 

building bridges to institutions so they can accept more 

credits, advising students better and faster so they can 

know where they stand and make good decisions. So I think 

the first part is more understandable, more likely to 

have some value. But asking the agent, the accrediting 

agency, to ensure that policies are effective in ensuring 

the success of students is vague, not really what we do, 

and hard to imagine how we would carry that out. Even as 
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we say, who are your students? Are they succeeding? And 

have you looked at the success rates of students in 

different categories, including, for example, transfer? 

As well as many others? The average time to completion is 

impossible. I'm sure Barmak has some wonderful way of 

saying that. It would be a number, but it would be an 

average of the person who brought three credits and the 

person who was on the brink of completion. And I just 

can't imagine how you'd calculate a little romanette two 

general education credits and requirements for the 

program of study, since you don't know that until the 

person has left and completed their program [30 seconds] 

with credits at the beginning, before you know what your 

major might be or how you will apply them. And finally, 

the assess the institution's rates seems very odd. I'd 

rather assess student performance the way we do and the 

way we're expected to do, then try to do what's in number 

three. It'd be more valuable for students.

MR. ROBERTS: Thank you, Jamie. Go 

ahead, Barmak.

MR. NASSIRIAN: You know, I was just 

going to- first of all, I think Scott is right in 

pointing out that it's very easy to say I accept credits 

without necessarily recognizing the credits as satisfying 

a particular bucket of requirements. You can have gen ed, 
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you can have electives, you can have required courses. On 

the point- on number three, as this business of explainprovide an explanation for any such institutions from 

which it doesn't accept credits. This was not intended as 

a sort of a public disclosure help. This was- my 

recollection is that it was an attempt at teasing out 

what the- what's going on because credits transfer 

typically on the basis of satisfying three requirements; 

quality, comparability, applicability. And if you look at 

the restriction in three, that says also accredited by 

the same agency. So accreditation is supposed to assure 

quality of two institutions. University of Chicago and 

University of Phoenix, to take two major American cities, 

both accredited by the same accreditor. If the University 

of Chicago systematically does not accept credits from 

the University of Phoenix, even though they are the same 

course and they seem to apply to the same program, that 

raises a question about the quality assurance practices 

of the accreditor, because quality would be the only 

other basis for denying the credit transfer. So I think 

that's the Department's attempt at getting at that 

notion. I don't know how well understood that is, but I 

thought that [inaudible]

MR. ROBERTS: Thank you, Barmak. Any 

other comments on 602.24? Jamie, go ahead. And you're 
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muted again.

MS. STUDLEY: The task really goes to 

the legs of comparability. So when I think about it, I 

think about the example of a person who took a psychology 

course and wants to transfer to a specialized psychology 

institution that's preparing people for clinical degrees. 

They may need different things. Similarly, we have people 

who may have taken biology someplace who then want to 

transfer into a nursing program at another institution. 

The comparability and applicability questions that you're 

describing may well apply, and they may not be able to 

use those credits toward that need for the building 

blocks of the program that they're talking about. That 

doesn't mean it wasn't quality in the first place where 

it was delivered for that purpose. It just isn't 

something you can carry over. In my experience, people 

don't say we won't take credits from X school. They say 

we will take credits that do this or include that or that 

are sufficiently comparable to what we're doing over 

here. So I think emphasizing what promises are made and 

that those promises are honest to people. The whole, you 

know, misleadingness, the timing of making the decisions 

and having the institutions be clear and meet their own 

qualitative standards are really important. And I share 

your sense; the problem is not just taking credits 
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because it doesn't help people to just pile up credits 

that don't help them move toward the degree and program 

that they want. And we are working on that.

MR. ROBERTS: Alright. Thank you, 

Jamie. Herman, was there any other specific areas you 

wanted to solicit the negotiators to focus on or 

potentially contribute proposals or new language on? Or 

would you like to move on?

MR. BOUNDS: Yeah, I just wanted to go 

back and make sureMS. STUDLEY: One second. There were a 

lot of pieces within 24.

MR. ROBERTS: Oh, yeah, sure. Go 

ahead.

MS. STUDLEY: Give us one second tois this the last call Brady on-? 

MR. ROBERTS: I think Herman maybe 

wanted to direct our attention elsewhere. So, Herman, do 

you want to move us back to the document? Then, Jamie, we 

can come back to you.

MR. BOUNDS: No, no, I just wanted toI think if there's no other comments, we can move. I just 

want to go back to- and make sure that Scott understood, 

because I think when I responded, it was in muddle with 

some other folks that we would take back his concerns 
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about the additional locations to the military 

institutions, which is in conjunction what Jamie was 

discussing earlier about- yeah, if there- you know, if it 

has, you know, US students in there that would be Title 

IV eligible. So I just wanted both of them to know that 

we're- we'll take that back and talk about that. I just 

didn't want that to be lost in conversation.

MR. ROBERTS: Great. Thanks. It looks 

like he's acknowledging that insight, so Jamie, go ahead.

MS. STUDLEY: I know we're jumping 

around a little, but page 36, that's for Jessica- and for 

me in little (i) at the top, the, has- and has operated 

such a program for at least two years. I was wondering 

why I didn't share Robyn's concern that was important 

when I remembered that a program that's been operated for 

less than two years is the most- will have gone through a 

substantive change review. It has gotten approval to add 

that program. So, in fact, it has the freshest review at 

that institution. And because like I- there are some 

cases in which there are- the new program is provided in 

part to help people make that transition. I think it 

serves the ability of students to move to a place that's 

been reviewed, and I don't see any risk in the quality of 

the program. So I'm just trying to have as many quality 

avenues for students to go to under these circumstances, 
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because that's the real challenge at that juncture.

MR. ROBERTS: Thank you. We'll go to 

Robyn next.

MS. R. SMITH: Yeah. I mean, my 

concern is when a school has- doesn't have any experience 

offering a program and suddenly takes on the program just 

to teach out the students. So that's my primary concern 

because I see that happen a lot. And it really doesn't 

serve the students because often either the teachers 

aren't qualified or they lack the equipment necessary to 

train the students, or they don't have the correct 

certifications to be able to train the students in the 

technology that they need to be certified in. So that's 

why I had suggested the two years because it seems like a 

program should be well established before we're sending 

over closed school students who've been devastated by a 

closure to, you know, another program in another school. 

It really should have a demonstrated history of being a 

good program. So that's my main concern. So I think, you 

know, it would be good to keep this provision or 

something comparable.

MR. ROBERTS: Thank you, Robyn. Jamie, 

go ahead.

MS. STUDLEY: You know, if it's- if it 

doesn't have the quality, the faculty, the equipment, the 
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capacity, the ability to do it, then it should neither be 

approved nor able to take more students. So it goes to a 

root problem. The effect of this provision would 

eliminate some very good new programs that were 

established, or some transition plans that were well 

reviewed and give students a home and a base. Without 

getting into examples, I'm familiar with situations in 

which the program that was either shifted or that was 

relatively new at a place would be the best kind of 

opportunity for students. And sometimes- you know, and 

the time to find a good program matters a lot to the 

students at that. So I respect your- you know, that 

you're operating from what you've seen. And I would just 

like to say I'd rather clean up the problems that you've 

seen than create a regulation that creates a new- a set 

of barriers against what might be some of the best 

options.

MR. ROBERTS: Alright. Barmak.

MR. NASSIRIAN: Unfortunately, the 

opportunity to clean up the root cause has already been 

lost because we didn't accomplish what we needed to do 

with substantive change. I know Jamie will remember in 

the aftermath of the collapse of Corinthian, the 

Department facilitated, quote unquote, the transfer, the 

sale of some of its campuses to a nonprofit entity which 
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maintained them despite its complete lack of prior 

experience, not only running a program or that program in 

question, any program, they had never run schools. It was 

a debt collection operation that decided to attempt to 

run these institutions, and it didn't work out well. So I 

think it is important that whoever we hand these people 

who have already been victimized once- that whoever we 

hand them to have at least a modicum of prior experience 

before we decide to roll the dice and just hope for the 

best, which is typically what we do. We, you know, in the 

moments of crisis, which is by definition, when teach 

outs matter most, I think everybody is vested, in good 

faith in many cases, hoping against hope that they can 

somehow manage to transition the student to a workable 

place where they can finish the program. And those are 

very dangerous transition points, because that's the 

point at which you are just internally incentivized to 

believe somehow that despite all the evidence to the 

contrary, things will work out. And they typically don't, 

and they haven't.

MR. ROBERTS: Thank you. Robyn, go 

ahead.

MS. R. SMITH: And I just want to say, 

you know, while this shouldn't happen, and I wish it 

didn't, this scenario I described where either the 
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faculty aren't qualified or they don't have the equipment 

and- or they don't have the appropriate certifications, I 

see that happen a lot. So it is an issue. It is something 

that is happening and needs to be addressed. I just- my 

purpose is just to make sure that people who are getting 

teach- offered teach outs are being offered high-quality 

programs.

MR. ROBERTS: Thank you, Robyn. 

Barring any additional new comments, potential proposals, 

concepts that might help to solicit a last call for 

feedback on 602.24 at this point. I know we've had a lot 

of conversation. Herman, anything else you'd want to ask 

of the committee? Do you want to move to- I think the 

next section would be 602.26.

MR. BOUNDS: Yeah, I think so.

MR. ROBERTS: Okay. That's the first 

page of the bottom of page 39. 

MR. BOUNDS: Yeah. So we're there. The 

only change here we're asking is the decision letters. 

And then we came back with a compromise or clear 

explanation in writing of the reasons again for the final 

decision of probation. Probation action. If we move on to 

(c), basically the same language there provides a 

decision letter or clear explanation in writing. 

Beginnings of the following actions. These are all 
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adverse actions under one and two, it's (c). And in 

three, we added a final decision to take another action 

that indicates an area of noncompliance with the agency 

standards such as warning accreditation with conditions, 

probation, show cause or similar action or decision 

letter to defer any institutional programs renewal of 

accreditation. And I just want to say here we said such 

as so that language there is not- it's just not limited 

to what we have listed. Changes under (d) where we'rewhere we're asking to make sure that the agency updates 

its website and directory, you know, based on 

accreditation decisions. And if you continue reading 

that, it's talking about within one business day of its 

notice to the institutional program. And under (c), 

again, minor changes there. Clear explanation of the 

reason for the agency's decision. We struck a brief 

statement summarizing the reason for the agency's 

decision and added that language. Under (f), there's some 

language, additional language for reporting for any 

decisions under paragraph (c)(3). We want- protect- proprospective students, excuse me, to be notified within 

seven days. So I think that that is all of the language 

changes that are under 602.26, and open up for comments 

for 26.

MR. ROBERTS: Great. Thank you. Jamie, 
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take us away.

MS. STUDLEY: A quick one. It's in 

(c)(3). And it refers to- and maybe the answer is within 

it. My concern was that a deferral does- may not indicate 

noncompliance and it would be confusing to students. And, 

you know, it would be confusing to publish and make a big 

deal about a decision to defer that might not be related 

to noncompliance. In fact, if there is noncompliance, you 

would have to act on that. Deferral could be for reasons 

like needing additional information, or there are times 

when a commission even says, we ran out of time today, 

we're going to do it next week.

MR. BOUNDS: I agree.

MS. STUDLEY: Students don't really 

need to get a notice about a deferral that makes them 

nervous about the status of their school. They do need to 

get notice about all of those other things.

MR. BOUNDS: That is definitely 

something we'll consider, Jamie.

MR. ROBERTS: Alright. Anyone else? 

Any other areas you'd specifically like to solicit 

feedback from the negotiators, Herman?

MR. BOUNDS: Nope. I don't think so.

MR. ROBERTS: If it's amenable to the 

group, I think we can move on to 602.27. It looks like 
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there's a minor change there. 

MR. BOUNDS: Yeah. Yeah, I think we 

talked about this a little in conversation previously, 

but yeah, we're just adding to report information on the 

number updated annually of US institutions that have 

applied for initial accreditation to the agency.

MR. ROBERTS: Gotcha. Anyone on the 

committee have feedback, question, comment on the change 

in 602.27? Seeing no hands, i think we can move down. And 

right now, Herman, the next change that I see, I think 

it's on the screen, is the bottom of page 44 under 

subsection (f) of 602.30.

MR. BOUNDS: Alright. And not too much 

there, just a strike-through, so, yeah.

MR. ROBERTS: Yeah. The next one that 

I see is the top of page 47.

MR. BOUNDS: Yeah. And we will go 

there. Yeah, just the minor change there. I won't read 

that one.

MR. ROBERTS: Any questions, comments, 

feedback from any of the negotiators? As we- I think the 

next change is 49, but I want to note that Erika is 

returning to the table for private nonprofits.

MR. BOUNDS: And these are just 

additions to our- to the recommendation language. And 
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this is recommendation language that Department staff 

would make.

MR. ROBERTS: Not seeing any immediate 

reactions. I think the next change is on 51.

MR. BOUNDS: Again. Same thing. This 

is recommendation language.

MR. ROBERTS: I believe 53 is the same 

language. That's the next modification.

MR. BOUNDS: Yeah. Same thing for 

consistency. Yep. Just about same thing.

MR. ROBERTS: Yeah, Jamie, sorry. Feel 

free to stop me if I'm moving too fast. You're on mute, 

by the way. Oh you mute- you're- you remuted yourself I 

think. There you go.

MS. STUDLEY: The- is there any place 

where there's an indication of what criteria the 

Secretary or his or her- there, I guess the right 

language is, their designated official would make a 

determination about limitations on the number of 

institutions or programs that an accreditor may approve?

MR. BOUNDS: Jamie, could you say that 

again? I want to make sure I'm understanding.

MS. STUDLEY: Is there any benchmark 

guidance? Anything beyond the words that the person- the 

individual may limit the number of institutions an 
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accreditor may approve? Is there any test or criteria 

that would apply to that determination? It seems-. 

MR. BOUNDS: No, I think. Go ahead, 

I'm sorry. Go ahead.

MS. STUDLEY: No, no. Go ahead, 

Herman.

MR. BOUNDS: Yeah. I was just going to 

say when we get to the- you know, when we're talking 

about the Senior Department Official's decision, you 

know, he would make that decision based on- so there's 

no, you know, there's no criteria- he would make that 

recommendation based on all the information that was in 

the record that was discussed, the staff recommendation, 

the NACIQI recommendation, any of the comments, what's in 

the transcripts. So he would make a- you know, he would 

make a decision based on, you know, based on all of that 

information.

MS. STUDLEY: May I follow up? Would 

the accreditor have an ability at some point to speak to 

the appropriate number if the official were considering a 

limitation, where in the process would it be able to 

speak to its capacity or the reasonableness of that 

decision?

MR. BOUNDS: Yeah, and that's already 

written in the regulations. I'll have to find the 
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specific provisions. Donna may get to it before I do, but 

think, you know, ten days after the meeting, you know, 

after- you know, there's a couple of places where you get 

a chance to make your responses and provide additional 

information. I'll have to look for the specific places 

where that's built in. I think it's 602.35.

FEMALE VOICE: Recording in progress.

MS. STUDLEY: The ten-day window is, 

if I recall, it'sFEMALE VOICE: Recording stopped.

MS. STUDLEY: -objection or revision, 

isn't it to the decision rather? And I'm wondering 

whether in the process of- [inaudible]

FEMALE VOICE: Recording in progress.

MS. STUDLEY: Oppositional but is, you 

know, getting a chance to weigh in. I know NACIQI can 

make a recommendation. So if NACIQI opens the question, 

don't you think we should restrict the number? Maybe the 

agency gets a chance there, if NACIQI thinks about it 

while the agency is still before them.

FEMALE VOICE: Recording stopped.

MS. STUDLEY: Is everybody else 

getting a recording on and off?

MR. BOUNDS: Yeah.

MR. MARTIN: Yeah, we're getting that 
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as well.

MR. ROBERTS: I was going to say 

sometimes the live team does that if there's disruptions 

on the team's broadcast just so they can have a 

contiguous feed. I'm not quite sure what happened this 

time, but sorry for the disruption.

MS. STUDLEY: That's okay. Do you see 

what I'm saying is, is there a chance for, in a 

constructive way, to engage with it as opposed to having 

a decision that the agency is trying to come back from or 

understand and correct?

MR. BOUNDS: Yeah. So I think there's 

two- I think under- if you go under 602.35, there isthat's where- so at that point- and that's responding to 

the advisory committee's, you know, recommendation. And 

that's where all of the correspondence that, you know, 

that an agency allows to make, that starts, you know, 

that starts that process. At the NACIQI meeting, of 

course, you know, you all can- you can- you know, once 

staff has made their recommendation, you know, agency 

gets to comment on that- on all those proceedings. But 

then once- when NACIQI makes their recommendation and 

staff makes their recommendations, those things go 

forward. And then under 602.35, that's when you get to 

(a) when it talks about within ten days following the 
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publication of the transcript added language, the 

advisory committee meets the agency department staff, may 

submit comments to the Senior Department Official. That 

starts that process where you can provide additional 

information to try to- you know, to basically say 

anything you want to say about the recommendations that 

have come from NACIQI and staff.

MR. ROBERTS: And it looks like Donna 

wanted to weigh in as well. Go ahead, Donna.

MR. BOUNDS: Yeah, Donna, you can come 

in and weigh in too.

MS. MANGOLD: Yeah, Jamie, what I 

wanted to say is limitations always been part of the 

regulation in terms of- or, you know, it's in the current 

regulations in terms of one of the remedies that the 

Senior Department Official has and something that can be 

recommended by the NACIQI board staff. So this is really 

just trying to put some descriptors around what a 

limitation might look like. So that's really all this is. 

So you would have the same procedural protections that 

you have in the process anyway, which is, as Herman said, 

you know, if NACIQI does it, if NACIQI decides to 

recommend the limitation, then you would be able to 

comment on it. If the Senior Department Official did it 

based on something that wasn't already in the record, you 
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have protections there. So this is just a little bit more 

description.

MS. STUDLEY: So you're saying this is 

really an expansion of what limit means or the examples 

of limit, not adding to [inaudible] Got it. Thank you. 

MS. MANGOLD: The limitation is also 

in the statute. So this is just- these are- because 

people sometimes don't know what limit means. So these 

are just ways that a limitation might be effectuated.

MS. STUDLEY: Got it.

MR. ROBERTS: Thank you, all. So I 

know we're like midway through sections right now. The 

next change that I see chronologically in the document, I 

believe is 58, which is the same text that's been 

inserted the last few sections. But negotiators should 

feel free to stop me if they've got questions, feedback, 

or comments on any of this. If not, I believe the next 

area of change is page 61, 604.12, Approval Standards.

MR. BOUNDS: Yeah, yeah. That is the 

next one. And so here this is- we're now under 604 which 

is basically- which are the new regs we're proposing for 

state boards of nursing. And yeah, we are on page 61. 

Here, we scratched refund policies based on the comments. 

But I would like to add we're also considering because we 

heard at the most recent NACIQI meeting, that there is a 
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state board of nursing that is the only 

approver/accreditor for a couple of nursing programs 

within their state. So they don't have any other 

institutional accrediting agency. So again, we've 

stricken it here because of, you know, comments that we 

got. But then in the NACIQI meeting, we got some 

additional information from one of the state boards of 

nursing that just appeared this time. So that's it. And I 

don't know if Amy is at the table. But I just wanted to 

explain that.

MS. ACKERSON: Yes, I'm here.

MR. BOUNDS: Okay. I just wanted to 

explain that. And then under (d) which is under site 

visits, that would be on, yeah, page 62.

MS. ACKERSON: Okay. So let me back 

up. So under approval standards, you've stricken refund 

policies, but you're going to put it back in?

MR. BOUNDS: We are considering 

information that we got from the NACIQI meeting.

MS. ACKERSON: So, can it be explained 

further their refund policies if the state Board of 

Nursing is the Title IV gatekeeper?

MR. BOUNDS: Yes. And it wouldn't bewe wouldn't say Title IV gatekeeper because they wouldn't 

be the gatekeeper. But we're saying if they don't have 
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any otherMS. ACKERSON: Okay, okay.

MR. BOUNDS: -institutional credits. 

So we'reMS. ACKERSON: Okay, okay.

MR. BOUNDS: Yeah, we're thinking 

about that. Yeah, yeah. You kind of read our mind there.

MS. ACKERSON: Yeah. No. Yeah. And I 

just want to just thank the Department for- I just really 

appreciate all them accepting all the feedback that I 

provided and the rest of the sections. And I have nothing 

else to- nothing else to add or comment on. It all looks 

really good to me now. Thank you.

MR. BOUNDS: Okay. We'll go through it 

in case there's anyone else out there that has any 

questions. So I guess we're on page 62.

MR. ROBERTS: Yep. And these are 

changes in 604.13, site visit documentation. 

MR. BOUNDS: Yeah. So we added review 

of budget information. And that's under the, you know, 

the site visit. Took the requirement for the NCLEX and 

took out the auditor's report and just have the 

attestation, excuse me, of financial resources sufficient 

to support the program outcomes. So if we don't have any 

other comments from anyone else, that takes us through 
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602.16. I mean, 604, I'm sorry.

MR. ROBERTS: Yeah. 15, program 

evaluation. But no, I don't see any hands at this point. 

Where do you want to head next, Herman?

MR. BOUNDS: Okay. And so let's see. 

Make sure we're on the same page. So I guess we get out 

of 604.

MR. ROBERTS: If, Joe, you can scroll 

up a little bit, I have a change in 604.15, program 

evaluation. Just the add-on to that sentence.

MR. BOUNDS: Yeah. And I think Amy 

said she didn't have any questions through 604, so unless 

anybody else does. 

MR. ROBERTS: Yeah, I just wanna make 

sure the committee was okay with this so far. I'm not 

seen any- anyone jump into the queue. We can go to the 

next section. Anything you wanted to highlight in any of 

these, Herman?

MR. BOUNDS: Nothing. Nothing at all.

MS. ACKERSON: I think they're- I 

think the rest mimics the regulatory text and the 

accreditation in 602 as well, so.

MR. BOUNDS: Yeah. And that's the same 

complaint guidance where you're at now that- that's in 

602.
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MR. ROBERTS: Yeah. I think the next 

area of more substantive change might be starting on page 

67.

MR. BOUNDS: Yeah. And 67 starts 611. 

So we can go through those. And again, since this is more 

of- related to FSA, I'm going to- or some of the 

eligibility requirements, I'm going to kind of ask Donna 

to really chime in here on some of these changes. So the 

first ones begin in (c). We added some language there to 

the sentence under (c). And then there's, of course, 

there's language under romanette three. And I will stop 

there. And then under multiple accreditation. I will just 

stop on page 67 and open it up for any questions.

MR. ROBERTS: Alright. Anyone have any 

questions? Feedback? Comments? Additional language for 

consideration? Oh, and I should have made mention Amy was 

at the table for specialized accreditors for nursing 

education. Thank you, Amy, but we are joined again by Dr. 

Laura Rasar-King. Barmak, go ahead. We can unshare- I 

think we can unshare the language at this point.

MR. NASSIRIAN: On (c), I just want an 

understanding of why the exemption for returning to its 

prior accreditor.

MR. BOUNDS: Donna. Do you want to 

take that one?
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MR. ROBERTS: Yeah. Donna, go ahead.

MS. MANGOLD: I can respond to that 

one. This was actually in response to one of Jamie's 

concerns the last time she- I think her example was an 

agency was with Deke, and they moved to WASC, and it may 

not have been Deke that you used as an example. And then 

they decided, really, their original accrediting agency 

was a better fit for them. So that's- that is what this 

is, to get to allow an agency that made the move to go 

back to their other agency, to not prohibit it.

MR. NASSIRIAN: By that logic, what 

is- why can't they make the judgment that agency number 

three is a better fit?

MS. MANGOLD: Well, what we're saying 

here is they have to stay for two years. So the issue 

here is you must stay for two years. So if they want to 

go to agency three, they would have to wait for two 

years.

MR. NASSIRIAN: Understood. It's two 

cycles, right? Not two years.

MS. MANGOLD: I'm sorry, I'm sorry. 

Yes. Two cycles. Yes.

MR. NASSIRIAN: You know the concern 

here, just so that I- because we are running out of time, 

I'll be blunt. The concern here is accreditor shopping 
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and if the two-cycle constraint is intended to prevent 

that or to mitigate that, I don't see any reason to give 

privileged status to the one they tried, because even 

there you're allowing for a certain level of accreditor 

shopping. If the two-year cycle is supposed to kind of 

force you to make a commitment to an accreditor, why 

should you- why should you be able to mitigate it if, 

contrary to your expectations, boy, you know, WASC ended 

up being much tougher than I had hoped. I'm going to go 

back to the previous guy. It doesn't make any sense to me 

to create this exception. Either eliminate it and apply 

it to everybody, or remove the two-cycle and allow the 

race to the bottom to begin on a level playing field for 

all accreditors. My recommendation would be to eliminate 

the highlighted language.

MR. ROBERTS: Barmak, would you be 

amenable to just codifying that in chat just so they can 

keep track of that suggestion in the transcript?

MR. NASSIRIAN: Yes, of course.

MR. ROBERTS: Great. Thank you. Jamie, 

go ahead.

MS. STUDLEY: That's an interesting 

thought. The only comment I wanted to make was that 

accreditors are in very different situations in relation 

to these provisions, and may weigh in as the regulatory 
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process moves forward. The only thing I wanted to mention 

now relates to romanette- (d) romanette three. Excuse me. 

There is one consequence of- no, I think we were looking 

right at- it was right on the screen. 

MR. BOUNDS: Yeah, that's it.

MS. STUDLEY: The effective date 

cannot be before the end of the current cycle. I'm just 

wondering what the motivation is and whether the 

Department has thought about the consequences of that. An 

institution that it- because it has the effect of 

constraining schools from making transitions among 

approved agencies and would have to meet dual standards, 

dual reporting requirements and dues. I'm just interested 

in what the potential what the purpose of that one was.

MS. MANGOLD: It would be on the 

theory that when you're with your accrediting agency, you 

should be constantly improving in accordance with the 

standards of your agency. And by cutting that period of 

accreditation short, it doesn't allow you to sort of 

fulfill that whole, that whole period. And so this is 

also an effort to sort of slow things down in terms of 

accreditor shifting. The other thing is, remember, this 

is in the context of a reasonable cause determination. So 

there's another part to this, which is FSA is actually 

reviewing voluminous documentation for each of these 
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accreditation changes. And so this is not just they get 

to submit a piece of paper, say they want to move to 

another agency. FSA is doing levels of review here also.

MR. ROBERTS: Did you want to add 

anything else, Jamie?

MS. STUDLEY: So I just wonder why 

that reasonableness review is not sufficient to both slow 

things down to allow the review to go by the Department. 

Obviously, they would have to stay with a place before 

they could even apply, and whether it wouldn't answer the 

question about, you know, assuring continuity or 

appropriate timing, case by case as opposed to a blanket 

rule.

MS. MANGOLD: We consider that, Jamie. 

And, you know, we're doing a lot. FSA is doing a lot in 

the reasonable cause determination part of this. And to 

then have this as a separate element of the reasonable 

cause determination, you know, the fact that it's a midcycle switch. We just felt it was more efficient for us 

and for FSA and for accrediting agencies and more 

predictive to just have this situation where you have to 

go through the whole cycle, that you can't flip midcycle. Again, there are lots of things sort of in balance 

here that we're trying to make work together.

MS. STUDLEY: Thank you. 
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MR. ROBERTS: Thank you. Any other 

questions or feedback on 600.11? Herman, anything else 

you wanted to ask the committee in terms of directed 

feedback or additional consideration?

MR. BOUNDS: No, I don't have 

anything.

MR. ROBERTS: Okay, I'll turn it back 

over to you then to keep walking through the last few 

pages. 

MR. BOUNDS: Alright. I think we're 

about completed. Right? So we have- on page 68, it looks 

like we have some minor language there.

MR. ROBERTS: I think these are the 

last new changes in the reg text.

MR. BOUNDS: Yeah. And it just has to 

do with what- for reasonable cause that is not a 

reasonable cause if these things- if those things below 

happen, so.

MR. ROBERTS: Any feedback commentary 

on those final amendments, proposed amendments? Well, let 

me say this. Herman, Greg, and team, were there otherwere there any other areas where you would want to return 

to? I'm seeing people with their faces saying, please 

don't do that. But any other areas where you'd like to 

solicit feedback, proposals, areas where you really would 
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like additional consideration? We are able to go till 

5:00 Eastern today. I don't think anyone in this room 

would be upset if we didn't go till 5:00 Eastern. But I 

wanted to make sure there was- we weren't leaving you 

without feedback or additional proposals where you might 

want some.

MR. MARTIN: Brady, no, not this time. 

But the Department would like to call a brief caucus so 

we can discuss this before we go back to thinking about a 

final vote for consensus. Thank you.

MR. ROBERTS: That sounds good. Do you 

know how much time roughly?

MR. MARTIN: I'll ask for 15 minutes. 

MR. ROBERTS: 15? Okay, so I'll check 

back in at 4:05 Eastern.

MR. MARTIN: Thank you very much.

MR. ROBERTS: Yep. Thank you. Alright. 

Welcome back, everyone. Thank you for your patience 

during that caucus period. It's my understanding that the 

Department made it- made a few changes to the document. 

So I'll turn it right over to Joe and Herman to walk 

through those changes. So take it away. And just looking 

at the time- and, Herman, you're off mute, if folks do 

have questions or feedback, not sure if we're gonna be 

able to get to all of them, so just be sure you put them 
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in the chat so they're captured as part of the transcript 

if you do have questions but time permitting, we'll see 

what the Department has time to do once they walk through 

the changes. So take it away.

MR. BOUNDS: Okay, great. So first 

change, we added a definition of executive officer. I'm 

not going to read that to you all. You all can take a 

look at that. Okay, I think we're ready to go down and 

all the changes are in blue. Here we took out the triad 

member. Yeah, the triad member. So we deleted item four. 

For the five-year prohibition. Okay, here we added in or 

licensing authorities and then in (b), based on comments, 

we added the language there that accepts in good faith. 

We'll pause there a minute for folks to digest 

everything. Okay. I think we can go ahead and move down. 

Okay, here we added, again, the language in blue. I'll 

let everybody take a look. We moved the- I think it was 

under (b), we had it. We moved it. We moved some of thatthat's further down, I'm sorry, I confused myself here, 

but I'm sorry. But we added the data reported by 

institutional programs. Or data from other resources. So 

we added that in blue. I'll just- I'll pause and let 

folks take a look at that. And then (d) is where we moved 

up adequate controls to prevent institutions or programs 

from manipulating or otherwise inflating their 
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performance. We moved this up out of the student 

achievement area. I mean, excuse me, out of the distance. 

Out of the distance education area. Sorry, man, it's 

late. Okay. And here we struck- this is where we struck 

this and moved it up under to be applicable to all areas 

of student achievement, not just related to distance 

education. [Inaudible] not an issue there. We added the 

representative sample. Yeah, I'm sorry. And the word 

audit is supposed to be stricken there. [Inaudible] I 

know there was- we had another- what we- else we had 

there. Yeah, reviews a representative sample of data. 

Yeah, I think that's it. Yeah. There we go. Reviews 

[inaudible]. Jamie?

MS. STUDLEY: I just said we trust 

you.

MR. BOUNDS: Okay. Yeah. This is a 

lot, man. We did it like, you know, 20 minutes. So I 

think we're good. Let's scroll down. Did we miss one? 

Yeah. Yeah. We struck enforcement and then we just put 

monitoring of intermediate checkpoints along the way. And 

then we removed seek eligibility because here they're 

just participating. So we hope that cleared up some 

confusion. I think we can scan down further. So we hope 

this language kind of cleared that up. And go back up. 

Yeah. And then we added this one here for foreign 
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additional locations of a domestic institution. Must 

include just a representative sample of those foreign 

additional locations. That should also encompass the 

additional locations on military installations. Here we 

have stricken the part about submitting all the exhibits. 

You just have to post the narrative portion and then 

descriptive list of what the exhibits are. Not just like 

exhibit A, but what's in exhibit A, so that should 

relieve some burden. Okay. Numbering changes. And here we 

added the word academic. I think we spoke about that 

earlier. So, not a big deal there. I think we put this in 

based on one of the comments. Okay. And here we struck 

average time to completion. I think that was a point of 

discussion. And then we added refund policies if the 

program of nurse education is not accredited by a 

nationally recognized accrediting agency. And that was 

based on discussions we had with the State Board of 

Nursing rep. And again, we struck enforcement and put in 

monitoring. We're trying to make sure that we made the 

adjustments in the regulations for State Board of 

Nursing, the same ones that we made in 602.

MR. ROBERTS: Would that be the end of 

the modifications, Herman?

MR. BOUNDS: I think that's the end of 

the modifications.
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MR. ROBERTS: Gotcha. There was one 

question in chat that- at least to a layperson, might be 

somewhat easy to answer. Donna, go ahead. Oh, you're 

muted, by the way.

MS. MANGOLD: We need to go back to 

602.19 because as we were editing and saving, it looks 

like some things that we intended to do may not have been 

caught. So before we go on, if we could catch that and 

we'll be sending it updated to your email inboxes.

JOE: Do you have the page for that?

MS. MANGOLD: Oh, yeah. On mine it's 

page 20.

JOE: Thank you.

MS. MANGOLD: There you go. Okay. So 

we- our intent was to strike the most current and 

available, so the things that are in the different type. 

And yes, so- and then they'll have to be some grammatical 

fixes there. So it'd be representative. There would not 

be a comma after representative. And then to the extent 

we've said audit, we intend to use the word review.

MR. BOUNDS: Thanks, Donna. I just 

blew right past that.

MS. MANGOLD: That's okay.

MR. ROBERTS: Anything else you wanted 

to highlight, Herman or Donna?
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MR. BOUNDS: Yeah, I think Amy had a 

question down at the- in the State Board of Nursing area. 

I want to make sure we wrote what we thought we should 

have wrote. It's in 604.

MR. ROBERTS: Yeah, that'll be towards 

the end of the document, I think.

MR. BOUNDS: Yeah, yeah. Right where 

we talk about the financial audit. I just want to make 

sure.

MS. ACKERSON: Right- yeah, yeah. That 

right there, that blue text, up. Right there. If the 

program of nurse education is not accredited by a 

nationally recognized accrediting agency. So not all 

states require nursing program accreditation. So this isonly comes into play if the nursing program approval 

agency is the accreditor is what I understood.

MR. BOUNDS: Yeah. So what we were 

trying to say, if the State Board of Nursing is the sole 

accreditor, then they would have to have these refund 

policies. So is that- so what we have is the refund 

policies are not required if the program of nursing.

MS. ACKERSON: Right. What I'm saying 

is that most states that are approved by the Department 

don't require programmatic accreditation. And so that's 

why the refund policy, we leave that up to the 
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institutional accreditation. So if you're telling me 

that, I believe it's New York, I thought the Board of 

Regents in New York was the accrediting agency. The 

statement is just- this is problematic. This doesn't get 

away from the issues we were having before we took it 

out. 

MR. BOUNDS: Okay. So I'm trying to 

see how we can maybe fix this to address that issue. So 

you're saying that all nursing programs within states are 

not required to be recognized by nationally recognized 

accrediting agency? So what we want to say then here isis that you have to have refund policies ifMS. ACKERSON: If the state agency is 

your accreditor.

MR. BOUNDS: Is the sole accreditor of 

the nursing programs.

MS. ACKERSON: Correct.

MR. BOUNDS: Donna, do you agree with 

that? Does that sound?

MS. MANGOLD: I was actually going to 

offer some other language.

MR. BOUNDS: Okay.

MS. MANGOLD: And I don't know if this 

will satisfy the issue for Amy. How about if the program 

of nurse education is a standalone program and does not 
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have institutional accreditation? Does that give youMS. ACKERSON: Yeah, that's fine.

MS. MANGOLD: Okay, thank you.

MS. ACKERSON: Thank you.

JOE: What was the last part of that, 

Donna?

MS. MANGOLD: Does not have 

institutional accreditation.

MR. ROBERTS: And then you said that 

satisfies your concern?

MS. ACKERSON: Yep, it sure does. 

Thank you. 

MR. ROBERTS: Jamie, go ahead.

MS. STUDLEY: Yeah, I certainly 

respect your thoroughness in catching so many of the 

areas that people were talking about. And for me, the one 

I'm trying hardest to understand relate to the thing that 

I think is most important and I think is really important 

to the Department, too. So I am at the relationship of 

602.16 and 20. Right back where we had some important 

conversations. And I'm trying to understand what effect 

the word monitoring has. The timeline must include 

monitoring of checkpoints, and I understand that the 

language in (b) is old carry-over language. This is not 

new about timelines and so forth, if I've got that right. 
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But unfortunately, they're not right next to each other. 

How- if you look at page 15, and the agency must set 

forth expectations for- with respect to student 

achievement in relation to the mission, which may include 

different standards. The agency must identify minimum 

expectations of performance and must be developed- no, 

must include consideration of student achievement on a 

disaggregated basis. That to me, right, those are the 

three kind of central musts. But if the agency determines 

that minimum expectations are not feasible or 

appropriate, it's- it can explain why. So what I want to 

know is, what are the musts in 15 that have to be- what 

are the things that would have to be done in 16? I'm 

sorry. Or if the, you know, minimum expectations are not 

feasible but other kinds of student expectations are, you 

have things that you're watching, how do you see the two 

of those connecting to each other? I'll tell you what I'm 

trying to do in a positive way, and that may make the 

sentence more clear. What's critically important to us is 

that we be able to have multiple measures and the kind of 

subtle- you know, it's not just one thing. We're not just 

doing a number of something. We're looking at subtle 

interactions [30 seconds] kinds of performance, and not 

turning them into a single bright line, but into 

something that you can monitor and say you are doing well 
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enough across all those measures or not. Can the 

Department speak to what they see actually happening? And 

what you would say you must do, you didn't do, or that 

was an okay practice along those lines.

MR. BOUNDS: That was a lot, Jamie, 

but I think for- I think for me, if we're back to the, 

again, the minimum expectation language and then the 

other part here where we talk about if that's not 

acceptable for a particular institution or group of 

institutions that then the agency must explain why, again 

for me, this is the agency's, you know, explanation of, I 

think you used the term bright lines. We're definitely 

not looking at that. We're just saying that whatever 

those things that you evaluate, they could be multiple 

things, that you would have to articulate what those 

minimum requirements may be. I mean, I don't know, Donna, 

unless you have a better way to explain what I'm trying 

to explain, but that's what we- go ahead.

MS. MANGOLD: I just want to mention 

that the entirety of this provision is qualified by the 

stem in romanette one that says we're feasible and 

appropriate to allow that kind of balancing that you're 

talking about, Jamie, those differentials, standards that 

might have to be applied. And again- and then we 

emphasize in (a) that it can be specific to a particular 
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institution or program or a type of institutions or 

programs. So we're trying to build in maximum flexibility 

to do the kinds of things that you want to do.

MS. STUDLEY: Where feasible and 

appropriate, the standards may. I'm not sure I'm there 

yet because this is a lot to absorb and at this late 

hour. But I'm trying to hear you and accomplish what you 

say you're meaning to do. You know, I would- where 

feasible and appropriate, the standards may.

MS. MANGOLD: It's got to be must. 

We're comfortable with must, and we're getting really, 

really close to the deadline that we have to take a vote.

MR. ROBERTS: Right. My suggestion 

would be some folks have noted potential concerns in the 

chat, if other people would like to weigh in, just so 

those are captured as a piece of the discussion, please 

do so. But at this point, Greg, would you like to move to 

a consensus vote or?

MR. MARTIN: Yes, we're going to move 

to consensus vote now.

MR. ROBERTS: Okay. You can unshare 

the document. As always, we're going to do a roll call 

vote based on how I see folks on my screen. So, love it. 

Can live with it. Serious reservations. Again, I want to 

say before this, thank you all for the discussion today 
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and throughout these past few months on these important 

issues. But first, Robyn, Legal Aid, thumbs up. Jason 

Lorgan, sideways thumb. Barmak Nassirian, thumbs up. 

Erika Linden, thumbs down. Jo Blondin, thumbs down. John 

Ware, sideways. Diana Hooley, thumbs up. Jillian Klein, 

thumbs down. Carolyn Fast, thumbs up. JoEllen Price, 

thumbs up. Jamie Studley, thumbs down. Jessi Morales, 

thumbs up. Joe Weglarz, sideways. Laura Rasar-King, 

thumbs down. DC, thumbs up. Greg Martin, thumbs up. So we 

are not in consensus on this issue. I will turn it over 

to Greg for closing comments.

MR. MARTIN: Thank you, Brady. I just 

want to say it's been my pleasure to be the negotiator 

for this round of Department's negotiated rulemaking. And 

I want to thank all of our negotiators for taking the 

time to join us these past couple of weeks. It's a lot of 

preparation, takes a lot of time out of their normal work 

schedule, so we very much appreciate it. I also want to 

thank those who negotiated with me. That would be Herman 

Bounds and David Musser, and I want to thank our 

attorneys, Denise and Donna, and those who worked in the 

background, especially Joe and Vanessa and all the people 

at the Department who labored so hard to make this 

possible. And lastly, FMCS for all of their help. So with 

that, I'll just say I hope you all have a nice spring. 
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It's been a joy working with you.

 
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Zoom Chat Transcript

Program Integrity- Session 3 , Day 4, Afternoon, March 7, 2024 

*Chat was copied as presented, as a result minor typos or grammatical errors may be present.

From A, Scott Dolan, Private/Nonprofit IHEs to Everyone:

educated guess cab

From P - Erika Linden - Private Nonprofit Institutions to Everyone:

Replying to "educated guess cab"

And one large glass

From P, Jillian Klein, Proprietary Institutions to Everyone:

David Cohen will come to the table to make a comment.

From A, Scott Dolan, Private/Nonprofit IHEs to Everyone:

 evidence-expectations-by-standard-guidelines v.2023-08-22 (1).pdf

From A, Scott Dolan, Private/Nonprofit IHEs to Everyone:

we need multiple measures. and certainly our accreditor does the same in terms of holding

us accountable. And it's appreciated

From P-Barmak Nassirian, Veterans & Military Students to Everyone:

It is clear that accreditors and the institutions they accredit are quite satisfied with the way 

the system works (for them). Sadly, there is a mountain of evidence, including comments this 

Committee has witnessed from student veterans and other Title IV recipients, that the system does 

not work for them. ED has a choice to make: does the "S" in FSA stand for students or schools?

From P - Carolyn Fast, Civil Rights/Consumer Advocates to Everyone:

Agree with Barmak's comment on need for accreditors to do better. The system isn't 

working to adequately protect students. The Department's proposals are modest efforts to 

strengthen the system.

From A, Scott Dolan, Private/Nonprofit IHEs to Everyone:

we can all do better. continuous improvement is the fabric of accreditation principles

From P-Jamie Studley, Institutional Accreditors to Everyone:

I did not say that we are fully satisfied -- i mean tha these provisions are not the best way 
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to get to the goal of satisfaction with every accredited institution

From P-Barmak Nassirian, Veterans & Military Students to Everyone:

If accreditors are doing such a great job, why are so many students getting ripped off?

From P-Robyn Smith, Legal Aid orgs. to Everyone:

I strongly support the Department’s proposal. Given that schools are already providing all 

of this information to accreditors on student achievement, then it should not be a problem to set 

minimum standards. Also, to be clear, this proposal does not prevent standards from being set by 

sector or even at an individual institutional level.

From A, Scott Dolan, Private/Nonprofit IHEs to Everyone:

just also recognize the vast majority of good work institutions do to dramatically transform 

people's lives. higher education completion remains one of the greatest drivers of socioeconomic 

mobility 

From A, Emmett Blaney, Students/Borrowers to Everyone:

Reacted to "I strongly support t..." with ���

From A, Emmett Blaney, Students/Borrowers to Everyone:

Reacted to "If accreditors are d..." with ���

From A, Emmett Blaney, Students/Borrowers to Everyone:

Reacted to "Agree with Barmak's ..." with ���

From P - Carolyn Fast, Civil Rights/Consumer Advocates to Everyone: 

Reacted to "If accreditors are d..." with ���

From P - Carolyn Fast, Civil Rights/Consumer Advocates to Everyone:

Reacted to "I strongly support t..." with ���

From A, Emmett Blaney, Students/Borrowers to Everyone:

Reacted to "It is clear that acc..." with ���

From A. Ashlynne Haycock-Lohmann (vets) to Everyone:

Reacted to "It is clear that acc..." with ���

From P-Barmak Nassirian, Veterans & Military Students to Everyone:
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The most important data point: $138 BILLION (to date) in federal loan discharges and writeoffs for accredited education that didn't pay off.

From P-Robyn Smith, Legal Aid orgs. to Everyone:

This is why accreditors should set minimum standards. 

https://www.thirdway.org/blog/when-will-the-watchdogs-bite.

From P - Carolyn Fast, Civil Rights/Consumer Advocates to Everyone:

Reacted to "This is why accredit..." with ���

From A, Emmett Blaney, Students/Borrowers to Everyone:

Reacted to "This is why accredit..." with ���

From Joe Weglarz NACUBO to Everyone:

Thank you!

From A, Emmett Blaney, Students/Borrowers to Everyone:

Reacted to "The most important d..." with ���

From A, Magin Sanchez, Civil Rights/Consumer to Everyone:

Reacted to "I strongly support t..." with ���

From A, Magin Sanchez, Civil Rights/Consumer to Everyone:

Reacted to "The most important d..." with ���

From A, Magin Sanchez, Civil Rights/Consumer to Everyone:

Reacted to "This is why accredit..." with ���

From P-Barmak Nassirian, Veterans & Military Students to Everyone:

+1 on JoEllen's comments. We regularly hear from veterans who have been robbed of their 

GI Bill benefits by unscrupulous providers

From A, Magin Sanchez, Civil Rights/Consumer to Everyone:

+1 to JoEllen and Barmak

From P - Carolyn Fast, Civil Rights/Consumer Advocates to Everyone:

+1 on JoEllen's comments.
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From A. Ashlynne Haycock-Lohmann (vets) to Everyone:

Reacted to "The most important d..." with ���

From A. Ashlynne Haycock-Lohmann (vets) to Everyone:

+1 Barmak’s comments, I have met with many Gold Star Families who have been taken 

advantage of for their GI Bill benefits and left with nothing. They heavily target our young widows 

who are single parents.

From A, Scott Dolan, Private/Nonprofit IHEs to Everyone:

i object only to overgeneralization

From P-Robyn Smith, Legal Aid orgs. to Everyone:

+1 on Barmak’s comments.

From P-Barmak Nassirian, Veterans & Military Students to Everyone:

specific enough on this one? :-) 

From A - Zack Goodwin (he/him), Financial Aid Administrators to Everyone:

Reacted to "+1 on JoEllen's comm..." with ��

From P - Carolyn Fast, Civil Rights/Consumer Advocates to Everyone:

+1 to Barmak's concern about need for stronger accreditor review of written arrangement 

provision. 

From P-Barmak Nassirian, Veterans & Military Students to Everyone:

Why inspect physical location? Because some may not exist: 

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/education/2021/01/23/education-dept-suggeststermination-acics-reagan-national-university/6671390002/

From P-Jessi Morales, Students/Borrowers to Everyone:

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/education/2021/01/23/education-dept-suggeststermination-acics-reagan-national-university/6671390002/

From A, Emmett Blaney, Students/Borrowers to Everyone: 

Reacted to "Why inspect physical..." with ���

From A, Scott Dolan, Private/Nonprofit IHEs to Everyone:
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i didn't bottom line. there was a question in there about rationale for the physical visit and 

how that relates to the goals of the actual site visit.

From A, Emmett Blaney, Students/Borrowers to Everyone:

Reacted to "https://www.usatoday..." with ���

From P - Carolyn Fast, Civil Rights/Consumer Advocates to Everyone:

Reacted to "Why inspect physical..." with ���

From A, Scott Dolan, Private/Nonprofit IHEs to Everyone:

 absolutely! 

From A-Michale McComis, Inst. Accrediting Agencies to Everyone:

When would it be appropriate for practitioners in the Department's view?

From P, Laura Rasar King, Specialized Accreditors to Everyone:

Programmatics would use practitioners.

From A, Scott Dolan, Private/Nonprofit IHEs to Everyone:

Erika will be rejoining

From P, Jillian Klein, Proprietary Institutions to Everyone:

+1 Laura's comments on this section

From (A) Dom Chase - Business Officers to Everyone:

I agree with Laura. This seems overly broad and could be harmful to institutions and 

programs which are found non-compliant with an easily fixable issue not related to a core or 

fundamental accrediting standard.

From P - Erika Linden - Private Nonprofit Institutions to Everyone:

Reacted to "+1 Laura's comments ..." with ���

From A - Zack Goodwin (he/him), Financial Aid Administrators to Everyone:

Reacted to "+1 Laura's comments ..." with ��

From P-Jamie Studley, Institutional Accreditors to Everyone:

+ 1 to Laura although it does relate to what an agency considers to be non-compliance
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From P-Jamie Studley, Institutional Accreditors to Everyone:

Agree with Michale about ok to require posting the agency narrative and Petition but not 

the exhibits.

From A, Emmett Blaney, Students/Borrowers to Everyone:

+1 to Barmak.

From P-Robyn Smith, Legal Aid orgs. to Everyone:

Public access to these documents is extremely important, so that student advocates and 

other interested parties have the ability to meaningfully comment on whether an accreditation 

agency should be recognized. They are gatekeepers for literally millions in taxpayer dollars. The 

only current way to access these documents is through the Freedom of Information Act, which can 

take months (and even years), long past the end of the recognition process. In addition, I 

understand that agencies already review documents for redactions before they submit them to the 

Department.

From P, Laura Rasar King, Specialized Accreditors to Everyone:

Posting the narrative petition is fine with me. Posting the hundreds and hundreds of 

documents that support it is unreasonable.

From P-Robyn Smith, Legal Aid orgs. to Everyone:

+1 to Carolyn and Barmak’s comments.

From P - Carolyn Fast, Civil Rights/Consumer Advocates to Everyone:

Reacted to "Public access to the..." with ���

From P-Jessi Morales, Students/Borrowers to Everyone:

Reacted to "Public access to the..." with ���

From A, Magin Sanchez, Civil Rights/Consumer to Everyone:

Reacted to "Public access to the..." with ���

From A-Michale McComis, Inst. Accrediting Agencies to Everyone:

No problem sharing the narrative to improve opacity, the exhibits are too extensive for 

posting in my view:

From (A) Dom Chase - Business Officers to Everyone:
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Well said Jamie

From A-Michale McComis, Inst. Accrediting Agencies to Everyone:

602.23(b) The agency must post all narrative responses included with an application for 

initial or renewal of recognition or a compliance report, with any redactions consistent with § 

602.30(f)(1) and (2), on its website no later than 90 days after submission to the Department. The 

agency may redact information that the agency is required to designate under ş 602.30(f)(1)(iii) 

from the materials before posting them on its website, except that the agency must redact any 

information received from institutions or third parties that it may designate under 602.30(f)(1) for 

submission to the Department.

From P, DC, HBCUs, TCUs, MSIs to Everyone:

let's keep going

From P, Laura Rasar King, Specialized Accreditors to Everyone:

We need a break.

From P, Jillian Klein, Proprietary Institutions to Everyone:

Reacted to "We need a break." with !!

From P, DC, HBCUs, TCUs, MSIs to Everyone:

Reacted to "We need a break." with !!

From P, DC, HBCUs, TCUs, MSIs to Everyone:

Removed a !! from "We need a break."

From A-Michale McComis, Inst. Accrediting Agencies to Everyone:

Unfortunately, teach-out "agreements" are becoming increasingly difficult to obtain - 

institutions simply are weary of obligating themselves to take on the burden. We are having better 

results with "transfer" agreements.

From P - Erika Linden - Private Nonprofit Institutions to Everyone:

Scott Dolan will return to table

From Donna Mangold - ED OGC to Everyone:

Confirming Jo's description of the HS programs. At the current time they are not eligible for 

Title IV.

From P - JoEllen Price, Financial Aid Administrators to Everyone:
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High School students are not eligible unless they are in the Second Chance Pell 

experimental program.

From A, Scott Dolan, Private/Nonprofit IHEs to Everyone:

I am out of my depth here a bit, but I am also hearing from some on the dual enrollment 

piece for additional locations. state-based tests on ability to benefit may make some dual 

enrollment programs eligible

From Joe Weglarz NACUBO to Everyone:

Yes, I agree

From P-Jamie Studley, Institutional Accreditors to Everyone:

that's why i hesitated to answer -- i thought there were situations where students could be 

eligible for T4 while studying at HS s

From P - Erika Linden - Private Nonprofit Institutions to Everyone:

+1 to Jillian's comment re transfer

From P - Erika Linden - Private Nonprofit Institutions to Everyone:

 Similarly, (e)(1)(iii) - seems like info on share of transfer students enrolled at an institution 

is not really a policy statement but would be a snapshot in time.

From P, Jillian Klein, Proprietary Institutions to Everyone:

Reacted to "+1 to Jillian's comm..." with ���

From A - Zack Goodwin (he/him), Financial Aid Administrators to Everyone:

Reacted to "High School students..." with ���

From P, Jillian Klein, Proprietary Institutions to Everyone:

It's unclear to me a bit if someone from ED is editing/accepting edits, but my reco was 

adding the provisional citation (668.13(c)(1)) to 602.24(c)(2)(iii).

From P - Carolyn Fast, Civil Rights/Consumer Advocates to Everyone:

Magin is joining for Civil Rights/Consumr

From P, Jillian Klein, Proprietary Institutions to Everyone: 

My other reco was striking (e)(2)(i)
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From A. Ashlynne Haycock-Lohmann (vets) to Everyone:

I would also add that international campuses that are not visited would put a target on 

service members who are already one of the most targeted populations. 

From A, Scott Dolan, Private/Nonprofit IHEs to Everyone:

good point Jamie, they can also present credit transfer throughout in many institutions

From A, Magin Sanchez, Civil Rights/Consumer to Everyone:

Carolyn is re-joining the table for Civil Rights/Consumer

From A, Scott Dolan, Private/Nonprofit IHEs to Everyone:

it's provokes thinking Barmak.

From P - Carolyn Fast, Civil Rights/Consumer Advocates to Everyone:

I'm back in for Civil Rights/ Consumer

From P-Jessi Morales, Students/Borrowers to Everyone:

Emmette joining the table

From P-Jessi Morales, Students/Borrowers to Everyone:

*no e

From A, Scott Dolan, Private/Nonprofit IHEs to Everyone:

great thank you!!

From A, Scott Dolan, Private/Nonprofit IHEs to Everyone:

and appreciated

From A- Alyssa Dobson: 4 Yr. Public Institutions to Everyone:

These transfer credit regs will be exceedingly difficult to parse out. Especially for schools 

with multiple degrees (over 100 programs of study), some of which have very specific transfer 

credit rules for programmatic accreditation. This seems untenable.

From P, Jillian Klein, Proprietary Institutions to Everyone:

Replying to "These transfer credi..." 

+1
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From P - Carolyn Fast, Civil Rights/Consumer Advocates to Everyone:

+1 to Barmak that two year requirement is important in this provision.

From A, Emmett Blaney, Students/Borrowers to Everyone:

+2 to Barmak and +1 Robyn.

From A, Magin Sanchez, Civil Rights/Consumer to Everyone:

+1 to Barmak and Robyn

From Donna Mangold - ED OGC to Everyone:

if the negotiators have language changes on the transfer of credit provisions, please add 

them to the chat. Thank you.

From P, Jillian Klein, Proprietary Institutions to Everyone:

Replying to "if the negotiators h..." 

Donna just flagging mine are above. Thank you!

From A-David Cohen, Proprietary Institutions to Everyone:

Sometimes the receiving school also receives the faculty and the necessary equipment. In 

situations where the prior institution fails for reasons that are not related to the program, these 

types of teach-outs can be really helpful to students. Creating the two year rule could hamstring a 

real solution. Agencies should have the discretion based on all the evidence in front of them.

From Donna Mangold - ED OGC to Everyone:

Replying to "if the negotiators h..."

Jillian, can you give us the time-stamp?

From P, Jillian Klein, Proprietary Institutions to Everyone:

Replying to "if the negotiators h..."

2:01 and 2:02 (I

From P, Jillian Klein, Proprietary Institutions to Everyone:

Replying to "if the negotiators h..."

(I'm CST so may show an hour later for you) 

From A- Alyssa Dobson: 4 Yr. Public Institutions to Everyone:
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Negotiated Rulemaking Program Integrity and 

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Replying to "if the negotiators h..."

My language suggestion would be to strike this section. I understand the problem however 

this is not the solution and will only further complicate the landscape.

From Donna Mangold - ED OGC to Everyone:

Replying to "if the negotiators h..."

 Jillian - found it.

From P, Jillian Klein, Proprietary Institutions to Everyone:

Reacted to "Jillian - found it." with ���

From P-Jamie Studley, Institutional Accreditors to Everyone:

agree with David -- we had a solid program that moved from a failing school ot a more solid 

one, and the students wanted to teach out at the new place. that was a great option for them and i 

believe would have been precluded by this

From A, Scott Dolan, Private/Nonprofit IHEs to Everyone:

erika will return to the table.

From P - Erika Linden - Private Nonprofit Institutions to Everyone:

Erika Linden returning to table for private nonprofits

From P, Laura Rasar King, Specialized Accreditors to Everyone:

Amy Ackerson will come to the table for 604.

From P, Jillian Klein, Proprietary Institutions to Everyone:

Amy glad you were here and appreciate your expertise!

From A, Scott Dolan, Private/Nonprofit IHEs to Everyone:

thanks Amy for the work!

From A, Scott Dolan, Private/Nonprofit IHEs to Everyone:

Reacted to "Amy glad you were he..." with ���

From P - JoEllen Price, Financial Aid Administrators to Everyone:

Reacted to "Amy glad you were he..." with ���
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From P - Erika Linden - Private Nonprofit Institutions to Everyone:

Reacted to "Amy glad you were he..." with ���

From A-Michale McComis, Inst. Accrediting Agencies to Everyone:

602.23(d)(1)(iv)

 

I ask the Department to allow accreditors to have a consistent policy for complaints with a 

commitment to help complainants to meet those requirements. For the purposes of consistency 

and fairness in the process, it is difficult for any oversight entity to be put in this position without 

some guardrails. This opens accreditor processes open to liability. I suggest the following revision to 

the Department's language:

 

(iv) A requirement that agency staff will provide assistance to a complainant who does not 

submit a complaint correctly under the agency’s prescribed method(s) in an effort to have the 

complaint submitted in accordance with those methods.

From A. Amy Ackerson, Nursing Education Approvers to Everyone:

Laura can rejoin for the rest of the conversation. Thank you for the opportunity. It has 

been very educational.

From P, Laura Rasar King, Specialized Accreditors to Everyone:

Laura back in for specialized accreditors.

From P-Barmak Nassirian, Veterans & Military Students to Everyone:

600.11(a)(ii)(C) delete "unless it is returning to its prior accrediting agency"

From P-Barmak Nassirian, Veterans & Military Students to Everyone:

sorry, citation is 600.11(a)(1)(ii)(C)

From A, Scott Dolan, Private/Nonprofit IHEs to Everyone:

�����

From Brady Roberts | FMCS Facilitator to Everyone:

Don't want to interrupt but do you need more time?

From P-Jamie Studley, Institutional Accreditors to Everyone:

could ED send us the changes?
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Institutional Quality – 3/7/24

From Donna Mangold - ED OGC to Everyone:

Replying to "could ED send us the..."

we are working on it

From Krystil Smith | FMCS Facilitator to Everyone:

 I just emailed the language as disseminated from the Department. Check your inboxes

From A - Zack Goodwin (he/him), Financial Aid Administrators to Everyone:

Reacted to "I just emailed the l..." with ����

From A. Amy Ackerson, Nursing Education Approvers to Everyone:

That is not what I thought you intended. Not all states require accreditation

From A. Amy Ackerson, Nursing Education Approvers to Everyone:

can it reflect refund policies are required if the state agency is the accrediting agency? 

From A-Michale McComis, Inst. Accrediting Agencies to Everyone:

Thanks for clarifying that Donna.

From P-Robyn Smith, Legal Aid orgs. to Everyone:

For the record, I am concerned by the reversal of "enforcement" to "monitoring" in several 

places; agencies don't necessarily need to remove a school's accreditation, but intermediate 

checkpoints should be more than just a box-checking exercise. Schools that fail to comply with 

agency standards cannot be given both infinite chances and such significant time without ensuring 

students who enroll along the way are protected.

From P - Carolyn Fast, Civil Rights/Consumer Advocates to Everyone:

Reacted to "For the record, I am..." with ���

From A, Emmett Blaney, Students/Borrowers to Everyone:

Reacted to "For the record, I am..." with ���

From P-Barmak Nassirian, Veterans & Military Students to Everyone:

Reacted to "For the record, I am..." with ���

From P-Jessi Morales, Students/Borrowers to Everyone:
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I am also concerned with the removal of enforcement in multiple sections as mentioned 

above by Robyn.

From A, Scott Dolan, Private/Nonprofit IHEs to Everyone:

amy is correct

From P-Robyn Smith, Legal Aid orgs. to Everyone:

For the provision that no longer requires the posting of exhibits to accrediting agency 

recognition petitions, but instead a narrative describing the exhibits, it would be helpful to add a 

requirement that the accrediting agency must post any exhibit within 24 hours of request by 

member of public. That way they don’t have to post all the exhibits, just those that members of the 

public request based on narrative description.

From A, Emmett Blaney, Students/Borrowers to Everyone:

Reacted to "I am also concerned ..." with ���

From P - Carolyn Fast, Civil Rights/Consumer Advocates to Everyone:

Reacted to "For the provision th..." with ���

From A, Emmett Blaney, Students/Borrowers to Everyone:

Reacted to "For the provision th..." with ���

From P-Jessi Morales, Students/Borrowers to Everyone:

Additionally there is also concern with the striking of "average time to completion for 

transfer students." That's a critical measure that provides important color for students about the 

likelihood their credits will transfer and the experiences of transfer students.

From A, Emmett Blaney, Students/Borrowers to Everyone:

Reacted to "Additionally there i..." with ���

From A, Magin Sanchez, Civil Rights/Consumer to Everyone:

Reacted to "For the record, I am..." with ���

From A-David Cohen, Proprietary Institutions to Everyone:

The NY Board of Regents is no longer recognized by the Secretary as a regional accrediting 

agency

From A, Magin Sanchez, Civil Rights/Consumer to Everyone:
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Negotiated Rulemaking Program Integrity and 

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Reacted to "Additionally there i..." with ���

From A, Magin Sanchez, Civil Rights/Consumer to Everyone:

Reacted to "For the provision th..." with ���

From A. Amy Ackerson, Nursing Education Approvers to Everyone:

Thank you David

From A, Magin Sanchez, Civil Rights/Consumer to Everyone:

+1 to Robyn and Jessi’s points

From P., Diana Hooley, State Attorneys General to Everyone: 

Reacted to "For the record, I am..." with ���

From P-Barmak Nassirian, Veterans & Military Students to Everyone:

Reacted to "Additionally there i..." with ���

From P-Barmak Nassirian, Veterans & Military Students to Everyone:

From P-Barmak Nassirian, Veterans & Military Students to Everyone:

Thank you to all Committee members, especially ED officials, for suffering my meddlesome 

comments and turgid prose

From A, Scott Dolan, Private/Nonprofit IHEs to Everyone:

Reacted to "Thank you to all Com..." with �����

From A, Emmett Blaney, Students/Borrowers to Everyone:

Reacted to "Thank you to all Com..." with ���

From P - Carolyn Fast, Civil Rights/Consumer Advocates to Everyone:

Reacted to "Thank you to all Com..." with ���

From P - Erika Linden - Private Nonprofit Institutions to Everyone:

Despite not being in consensus, thank you to Department for hearing concerns!

From P-Barmak Nassirian, Veterans & Military Students to Everyone:

And thanks to FMCS colleagues for a great job
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Negotiated Rulemaking Program Integrity and 

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From P, Jillian Klein, Proprietary Institutions to Everyone:

Thanks FMCS!

From A-David Cohen, Proprietary Institutions to Everyone:

Thank you to all, I have learned a great deal and developed great respect for the unique 

role each of you perform.

From P - Carolyn Fast, Civil Rights/Consumer Advocates to Everyone:

Thank you everyone for all of your hard work!

From A, Scott Dolan, Private/Nonprofit IHEs to Everyone:

I appreciate the time and effort too. Appreciated hearing the multiple perspectives

From A - Zack Goodwin (he/him), Financial Aid Administrators to Everyone:

So great to work with all of you!

From A, Michael Cioce, 2 Year Colleges to Everyone:

Thanks FMCS

From P-Jamie Studley, Institutional Accreditors to Everyone:

there was a lot of good movement here and it made it a close call. KNow thatccreditors 

want to improve and look forward to wkring iwht ED now as you move to NPRM

From A, Scott Dolan, Private/Nonprofit IHEs to Everyone:

Reacted to "there was a lot of g..." with ���

From A-Michale McComis, Inst. Accrediting Agencies to Everyone:

Reacted to "there was a lot of g..." with ���

From P-Jamie Studley, Institutional Accreditors to Everyone:

can we say thank you and comment briefly??

From A-Michale McComis, Inst. Accrediting Agencies to Everyone:

Reacted to "can we say thank you..." with ���

From P - Erika Linden - Private Nonprofit Institutions to Everyone:

+1 to Jamie
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From Brady Roberts | FMCS Facilitator to Everyone:

And Magin- enjoy Pat's!

From A, Magin Sanchez, Civil Rights/Consumer to Everyone:

Reacted to "And Magin- enjoy Pat..." with ���