Dive Brief:
- Under Secretary of Education Ted Mitchell, while speaking at the Arizona State University Global Silicon Valley (ASU-GSV) Summit in San Diego this week, said he would give the Obama administration’s progress on higher education goals a grade of “incomplete.”
- Mitchell said his team’s work has been a long game that will continue to bear fruit in the coming years, though he criticized the limited progress on increasing the number of college graduates, according to U.S. News & World Report.
- In discussing the overhaul of the College Scorecard, Mitchell said it was better than the ranking system idea that preceded it but remains far from perfect — though he would like to improve it with more data from the Internal Revenue Service, Social Security Administration, and Department of Labor, like the U.S. Department of Education now has from the Defense and Veterans Affairs Departments.
Dive Insight:
The Obama administration’s Department of Education has less than a year left to meet its goals and continue laying the foundation for future gains. On higher education, at least, the department seems to be moving aggressively toward reform of the accreditation system. Obama has implemented new regulations about what information accreditors need to submit and how they should organize it so the public can more easily decipher what is happening at member colleges and universities. Thirteen state attorneys general have come forward to oppose the accreditation renewal of the for-profit accreditor ACICS. In a department that has already cracked down on the for-profit college industry, this may be a chance to shake up the sector even more.
