Unregulated Colleges Stir Fears of Diploma Mills
HURST — Sitting in his new office — the sparsely decorated basement of an unassuming 9,000-square-foot building just outside Fort Worth — Christopher Cone cut to the chase during a discussion of academic accreditation.
“It isn’t necessary, and it doesn’t benefit anybody,” said Cone, the president of Tyndale Theological Seminary & Biblical Institute.
The former is certainly true in the case of Tyndale, a private, Bible-based institution with only religious course offerings. The seminary won freedom from state regulation over the granting of degrees in HEB Ministries Inc. v. Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board, the little-discussed 2007 Texas Supreme Court decision ...
Comments (10)
Ron Blancarte
Funny, at my work, we just had a discussion about a similar topic. While it wasn't about accreditation, it was about the perceived quality of one's degree as earned from a particular school. With or without accreditation, a school will have a perceived quality that makes their degrees have an inherent value. I would have to assume that just like secular schools, seminaries will have similar perceptions. Add in the fact that now you have a bunch of unaccredited seminaries handing out degrees, you would have to think that those seminaries would get a bad rep for a lower quality diploma.
HOWEVER, I have to disagree with Mr Cone that any school should be able to hand out degrees or their equivalents. One problem, and he basically makes this point himself in the article, is that not everyone will do their due diligence when seeking out a seminary. His seminary is found mostly via word of mouth (70% by his estimate). That means that you have a student body spreading the word those those that want secondary education in theology about his school, and getting others to enroll. It is likely that many of these people look at Tyndale and see a great school, not realizing that the "degree" they get doesn't carry a lot of weight behind it (it is possible it isn't worth the paper it is printed on).
Ultimately, I have to say that the courts got the 2007 decision wrong. As a degree seeker. I shouldn't have to seek out on my own that a secondary school has accreditation. If a school hands out degrees, I should know that they are backed by an educational standard that gives them some value. Worse, at the ages that one would be looking into the seminary, it is likely that people don't necessarily have the experience or insight to look at a school's accreditation (or lack thereof), especially when being informed about the school, as a great place to get a religious education, by word of mouth. Finally, I don't think that the Texas Higher Educational Board simply hands out accreditation arbitrarily. Schools must meet a certain criteria, and once that criteria is met, then receiving accreditation should be a simple task of paperwork. Thus the regulation of religious education has little to do with expressing preference (in religion or school) and solely to do with meeting a standard.
I hope that the state can correct this mistake.
Sandra Radler Phillips via Texas Tribune on Facebook
This is how you get future Republican voters.
Richard Tew via Texas Tribune on Facebook
and "regulated" universities operating under affirmative action-style quotas engender the same type of "fear," trib. That's how you get future democrat activists, sandra.
Robert Rister via Texas Tribune on Facebook
A relative of mine was senior US senator for Georgia for 36 years. His son was a VP of Lockheed. His grandchildren went to Liberty University. They are janitors. And they only got that job because of their family connections.
Atech Homenet via Texas Tribune on Facebook
nah! religious schools are uptight and dogmatic. They want funds. I've never seen so many non-sense course/classes in all my life. No there won't be any 'diploma mills' from the more established institutional educators. You may see some on the fringe but everyone will know that the diplomas are poop.
Arthur M. Thomas IV via Texas Tribune on Facebook
Dumping cheap government money on the education system contributes to diploma mills more than anything else.
The market can determine the value of a diploma just fine on its own. Schools pumping out worthless diplomas will quickly be recognized for it and lose value fast. The state doesn't need to be regulating this at all.
Mark Farley via Texas Tribune on Facebook
IMHO, strict independent accreditation is the key.
Christopher Cone
12/10/2011
Re: A Response to “Unregulated Colleges Stir Fears of Diploma Mills” by Dr. Christopher Cone
(http://www.texastribune.org/texas-education/higher-education/questions-surround-unregulated-religious-colleges/)
I think it is important to begin with a word of gratitude to Mr. Reeve Hamilton of the Texas Tribune for shining some light on the ongoing and sometimes seemingly conflicting challenges for both church and state in regard to education. I enjoyed the 4-5 hours of discussion with Mr. Hamilton, and I commend him for the general accuracy and evenhandedness of the article. Still there were a few important aspects of our discussion that I had hoped to see published, and which were - perhaps due to the limited word count available for the story – not included in the article.
For example, we spent a good deal of time discussing Tyndale’s institutional transparency – both financial and academic. Tyndale is open (though certainly not defiant) about its status as unaccredited and its three specific reasons for maintaining that status (for the full discussion, please view the About Us section of www.tyndale.edu)
In addition to transparency regarding accreditation, Tyndale has always been also very open about its course offerings, faculty qualifications, degree requirements, and even the specific content of each course. Prospective students can, for example, view course syllabi and sample lectures before enrolling in order to discover the course quality and workload. These are important aspects that speak to the quality of Tyndale’s course of study and profoundly distinguish Tyndale from any diploma mill. Tyndale’s degrees are earned by long, vigorous effort on the part of our students. Tyndale is not alone in many of these qualities – I know of a number of Bible institutes - not only in Texas, but also in other states and abroad – which operate with these same types of standards. Yes, of course, there are some online seminaries out there that are indeed functioning, as diploma mills, but the difference between legitimate and illegitimate are fairly obvious to anyone who gives even a cursory examination. It is also notable that in the four years since the Texas State Supreme Court ruling, I have not become aware of any new religious education diploma mills in the state of Texas.
Further, we discussed Tyndale’s history with the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board, and I reiterated our position that Tyndale does not view itself as being in conflict with the THECB, rather Tyndale simply wishes to fulfill its mission of preparing godly leaders for ministry of the word of God. Tyndale recognizes that the THECB has some legitimate responsibilities. For example, the inspecting and repair of bridges, as cited in the article, is primarily done with state and federal funds. It is fully consistent with the appropriation of those funds that degrees leading to the qualification of inspecting and repairing bridges be regulated by the state. Tyndale is not educating people to inspect or repair bridges. We are educating people to understand the Bible, to grow spiritually, and to prepare for ministry – these are areas in which the state has no jurisdiction or qualification whatsoever. Thus, I would not suggest that accreditation or state regulation is not helpful in certain contexts (my comment that accreditation “isn’t necessary and doesn’t help anybody” was specifically in the context of theological and religious education). But those contexts are limited, as the Texas State Supreme Court agreed in 2007.
The THECB’s issue with the Institute for Creation Research illustrates the overreach. For years previously, ICR offered an accredited (by TRACS) MS in the state of California. The National Board of education recognizes that accrediting agency for graduate study. Texas, through the THECB, does not. Thus, when ICR moved to Texas, as I understand it, ICR was told it would have to discontinue its longstanding MS. In other words, the degree met national standards, but not the standards of the THECB. Similarly, for Tyndale to pursue accreditation acceptable to the THECB, we would have to either go through regional accreditation or through the Association of Theological Schools (ATS). Either path to accreditation would threaten some of our core values (especially those related to keeping our tuition as low as it is, and thereby reaching people who otherwise couldn’t afford a Biblical education). That is not to say that accreditation and state regulation do not have value in certain contexts – they certainly do. But in Biblical, theological and religious education, the benefits often don’t outweigh the costs.
The greatest single “benefit” of accreditation is the access to federal funds (guaranteed student loans, etc.). The disadvantages of the current model are coming into view. With federal funds come federal controls. Students are graduating with a higher rate of student debt than ever before (an average of $25k for graduating seniors in 2010, as per the Education & the Workforce Committee, 2011). Tyndale is uninterested in accessing these funds, as we are committed to providing affordable, quality education to students who, upon graduating, will not be constrained in their ministry choices by financial debt.
So, Tyndale continues, as it has for more than 20 years, to offer high quality Biblical education, as affordably as possible, delivered by the most qualified people available. While Tyndale will always be submissive and respectful to the state, we remain submissive and respectful to our Lord. Our job is not to impress the THECB or an accreditation board, or even our students. Rather, our mission is to be faithful with the stewardship with which God has entrusted us. We are not alone, as there are many other schools casting the same vision and applying the same diligence. We appeal to authorities such as the THECB and other state agencies not to make our jobs in education more difficult simply because there may be some in education who do theirs poorly.
-Dr. Christopher Cone
President, Tyndale Theological Seminary & Biblical Institute
ccone@tyndale.edu
Another 99%
These colleges should be renamed, “ The Flim-Flam Colleges”. They just teach people how to lie, and manipulate, sincere people into giving up their families money, and become mindless zombies of manipulation. Its no wonder, the GOP , and so, so corrupt. Jesus is not a corporatiion.
Jeanne Moseley
The Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board (THECB) is necessary to establish what higher education schools are accredited, but from what I've witnessed, THECB doesn't seem to have the power necessary to enforce state regulation.
I became aware of a Texas high school principal whose resume lists his Master's Degree is from a college in Louisiana. This college, Crescent City Christian College, has never been accredited by THECB. By way of public record, THECB shared documents with me that state "Crescent City Christian College never had a campus, instructors or a library." The "college" was owned by a Louisiana attorney and a former coach. It's campus address as listed by the Louisiana Secretary of State was a private residence in a suburb of New Orleans.
And yet, this Texas principal has been employed since the mid-90's and continues earning the salary of someone with a valid Master's Degree. Apparently, there are others (all coaches) in the DFW area who also have degrees from that same college.
Texas school districts are required to verify all employment applications to make sure an applicant's degree is from an accredited college as recognized by THECB. Either that step wasn't taken or the school district decided to ignore what they discovered.
Byron Harris, an award winning and distinguished news reporter with WFAA-Dallas, investigated this particular college and the many coaches in north Texas who also claim degrees from Crescent City Christian College. He exposed the full story about an unaccredited college issuing paper diplomas that were accepted by an independent school district in Texas. His report is almost 10 years old...and nothing was ever done by any school district, the Texas Board of Education or THECB.
I actually don't think it matters if we regulate colleges or universities and declare them either accredited or not. What matters is that when there are state regulations in place, and those regulations are ignored, someone somewhere within the system assumes responsibility to do the right thing...and put a stop to nonsense like this/
Right now in our state, there are educators with paper degrees from Crescent City Christian College that are worthless. Most all regulating agencies know about it, and if I can connect the dots, surely a school district superintendent knows enough to realize these degrees are not valid.