Welcome
The University of Michigan Mission Statement
“The mission of the University of Michigan is to serve the people of Michigan and the world through preeminence in creating, communicating, preserving and applying knowledge, art, and academic values, and in developing leaders and citizens who will challenge the present and enrich the future.”
This website provides information about activities the University of Michigan is undertaking toward re-accreditation as an institution of higher education in 2010. With the support of the Higher Learning Commission of the North Central Association, the University of Michigan makes every effort to plan for and implement a set of activities linked to the re-accreditation process that are both meaningful and useful to the University community and to the many constituencies we serve. This site provides up to date information about those activities.
The 2010 accreditation process is lead by Professor Ben van der Pluijm in partnership with Glenda Haskell, both in the Provost Office, with administrative support by Denise Newton.
Background on Institutional Accreditation
The University of Michigan receives its institutional accreditation status from the Higher Learning Commission (HLC), an independent corporation that holds membership in the North Central Association of Colleges and Schools (NCA). The NCA is one of six regional agencies that provide institutional accreditation on a geographical basis as part of a national accreditation structure in which non-governmental agencies accredit institutions of higher education.
Since the Federal Government depends on this accreditation structure to decide which institutions qualify for disbursement of Federal financial aid funds, it is essential for the University to be formally accredited in this way. The accreditation process has two primary goals—to ensure the quality of institutions of higher education and to promote improvement.
The HLC evaluates institutions based on five criteria: mission and integrity; preparing for the future; student learning and effective teaching; the acquisition, discovery, and application of knowledge; and engagement and service.
Every ten years, the University files a request with the Higher Learning Commission to be re-accredited, with the next review scheduled for 2010. The five criteria form the basic structure for a Self-Study that the U-M will engage in. However, the HLC allows complex institutions like the U-M to tailor our re-accreditation activities through a special emphasis study (SES) of a topic that is important to the institution. This SES option allows the university to structure the process in ways that are both meaningful and useful. The leadership of the University has chosen Internationalization as the topic of the SES for activities linked to the 2010 re-accreditation process.
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