The Distance Education Accrediting Commission (DEAC), formerly the National Home Study Council and then the Distance Education and Training Council, is a private and non-profit national

educational accreditation Educational accreditation is a quality assurance process under which services and operations of educational institutions or programs are evaluated and verified by an external body to determine whether applicable and recognized standards are me ...

agency in the United States specializing in the accreditation of (51 percent or more of)

distance education Distance education, also known as distance learning, is the education of students who may not always be physically present at school, or where the learner and the teacher are separated in both time and distance; today, it usually involves online ...

programs of study and institutions. The DEAC is recognized as a U.S. institutional accreditor by both the

U.S. Department of Education The United States Department of Education is a United States Cabinet, cabinet-level department of the federal government of the United States, United States government, originating in 1980. The department began operating on May 4, 1980, havin ...

and the Council for Higher Education Accreditation (CHEA).

History

The DEAC was established in 1926 as the National Home Study Council (NHSC), a

trade association A trade association, also known as an industry trade group, business association, sector association or industry body, is an organization founded and funded by businesses that operate in a specific Industry (economics), industry. Through collabor ...

for correspondence schools.Michael G. Moore and William George Anderson (2003),
Handbook of Distance Education
', Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Mahwah, NJ. . p. 39 Its formation was in response to a

Carnegie Corporation The Carnegie Corporation of New York is a philanthropic fund established by Andrew Carnegie in 1911 to support education programs across the United States, and later the world. Since its founding, the Carnegie Corporation has endowed or othe ...

study that found a lack of standards to ensure quality in correspondence schools and protect their students and the public from

fraud In law, fraud is intent (law), intentional deception to deprive a victim of a legal right or to gain from a victim unlawfully or unfairly. Fraud can violate Civil law (common law), civil law (e.g., a fraud victim may sue the fraud perpetrato ...

. Under its first director, John Noffsinger, the NHSC developed a list of minimum standards for

proprietary schools For-profit education (also known as the education services industry or proprietary education) refers to educational institutions operated by private, profit-seeking businesses. For-profit education is common in many parts of the world, constituting ...

. The NHSC adopted the name Distance Education and Training Council (DETC) in 1994 and its current name in 2014.The Distance Education and Training Council is now the Distance Education Accrediting Commission
/ref>

Accreditation

In 1959 the NHSC was formally recognized by the U.S. Office of Education as an accreditor of higher education institutions. Currently the DEAC is recognized by the

Council for Higher Education Accreditation The Council for Higher Education Accreditation (CHEA) is an American organization of degree-granting colleges and universities. It identifies its purpose as providing national advocacy for academic quality through accreditation in order to ...

and the

United States Department of Education The United States Department of Education is a cabinet-level department of the United States government, originating in 1980. The department began operating on May 4, 1980, having been created after the Department of Health, Education, and ...

as an accreditor of institutions of

higher education Tertiary education (higher education, or post-secondary education) is the educational level following the completion of secondary education. The World Bank defines tertiary education as including universities, colleges, and vocational schools ...

. According to the DEAC, it is made up of over 100 distance education institutions located in 21 states and 7 countries. These institutions include non-profit institutions, trade associations, for-profit companies, colleges and universities, and military organizations.DEAC History
DEAC webpage

References

External links

*
HETA Directory
{{DEFAULTSORT:Distance Education Accrediting Commission Organizations established in 1926 Educational organizations based in the United States Non-profit organizations based in Washington, D.C.

History

Accreditation

See also

References

External links