| Accreditation is a voluntary process that qualifies programs for access to Federally-subsidized Title IV student loans and grants. Without accreditation, schools are at a competetive disadvantage, since their students could not qualify for government-subsidized student loans. There are two types of accrediting agencies, regional and specialty. Regional accreditation is generally used for institutional accreditation, to ensure that the infrastructure and administration are functional and stable. Coursework at regionally accredited schools is readlily transferable from one accredited school to another, and is the most commonly accepted standard for all public high schools, colleges, and universities. Specialty accreditation is generally limited to programatic accreditation of specialty degree programs. The majority of specialty accrediting agencies are involved with the heatlhcare professions. With the exception of chiropractic, naturopathy, and oriental medicine, all other specialty accrediting agencies for health care professional degree programs require regional accreditation as one of their standard criteria. |