President Trump Takes Real Action to Reform College Accreditors
PRESIDENT TRUMP SIGNED AN EXECUTIVE ORDER TO IMPLEMENT NEEDED COLLEGE ACCREDITATION REFORMS
The Higher Education Act of 1965 restricts federal grant and loan support to students attending officially-recognized (accredited) institutions of higher education. Accrediting agencies must, in turn, be recognized by the Department of Education. Accreditation serves a vital quality control function; however, the accreditation system suffers from serious flaws.
On April 23, 2025, President Trump signed a new executive order to bring needed reforms to this system.
FOR YEARS, COLLEGE ACCREDITORS HAVE NEGLECTED ACADEMIC QUALITY
- Over a six-year period, more than a third of undergraduate students fail to graduate. These students incur debt without increasing their earnings potential.
- Almost 25% of bachelor’s degrees and more than 40% of master’s degrees yield negative returns on investment.
- Predatory admissions practices and useless degrees abuse students and taxpayers alike.
FOR YEARS, COLLEGE ACCREDITORS HAVE MANDATED ILLEGAL RACIAL DISCRIMINATION
- Accreditors often require institutions to implement illegal Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) policies.
- The American Bar Association’s Council of the Section of Legal Education and Admissions to the Bar, the only federally recognized accreditor for Juris Doctor programs, requires law programs to show a “commitment to diversity” by “having a student body [and faculty] that is diverse with respect to gender, race, and ethnicity.”
- The Liaison Committee on Medical Education, the only federally recognized accreditor for medical doctor programs, requires medical schools to “engage in ongoing, systematic, and focused recruitment and retention activities, to achieve mission-appropriate diversity outcomes among its students.”
THE TRUMP ADMINISTRATION IS REVAMPING THE BROKEN ACCREDITATION SYSTEM
- President Trump has directed the Department of Education to set new standards for accreditors emphasizing quality instruction, intellectual diversity, competition and innovation, compliance with state and federal law, mitigating credential inflation, and prohibiting illegal discrimination.
- The President has directed the Secretary of Education to resume recognizing new accrediting bodies, to inform accreditors of Department of Education civil rights investigations of member institutions, and to take other measures to streamline accreditation. He further instructed the Secretary to require that accreditors mandate race- and sex-blind reporting of student outcomes.
PRESIDENT TRUMP IS ENDING ILLEGAL RACIAL DISCRIMINATION IN HIGHER EDUCATION
- President Trump has directed Secretary of Education to revoke recognition of accreditors who require illegal racial discrimination, including discrimination under the guise of DEI.
- President Trump has directed the Attorney General and the Secretary of Education to terminate illegal DEI policies in law schools. He further directed the Attorney General and the Secretary of Education to, in consultation with the Secretary of Health and Human Services, terminate such policies in medical schools