Talk:Trinity College of Florida

Regional accreditation

Can someone explain regional accreditation and why is that important? The school is listed in the CHEA database [1]. -- JJay

Accreditation is the unique American way of assuring quality in education. While in many countries governments approve educational institutions, in the Unites States various voluntary associations were formed that allowed member institutions to set standards designed to guarantee educational quality. These voluntary associations are known as accrediting organizations. Accrediting organizations themselves may seek approval from the government through the U.S. Department of Education (USDE), and from outside of government, through the Council for Higher Education Accreditation (CHEA). Students attending colleges accredited by approved accrediting agencies are eligible for federal financial aid programs.

Approval by either USDE or CHEA requires an accrediting organization to meet a set of stringent requirements. There are different types of accreditors. The first type is institutional accreditors, which are accrediting organizations that review entire institutions. The second is programmatic accreditors, which review specific programs or subject areas within an institution, such as music or social work, etc. Among institutional accreditors there are eight regional accreditors each of which operates in a specific geographical region. In addition, there are also national accreditors, who accredit all institutions of a particular type across the entire country. Some national accreditors review vocational and professional institutions and others accredit faith-based institutions. The national accreditor for Bible colleges is the Commission on Accreditation of the Association for Biblical Higher Education (ABHE), established in 1947, which has undergone the required review process and has been recognized as a national institutional accreditor by USDE and CHEA. ABHE goes through the same rigorous approval process as the regional accreditors and neither USDE nor CHEA recognize any quality difference between regional accreditation and national accreditation.

Trinity College of Florida is a Bible college and as such has sought and received accreditation by the national accreditor of our type of institution, ABHE. To summarize, Trinity is accredited by a national institutional accreditor approved through the same process and according to the same criteria as the regional accreditors.

Students should realize that decisions about which credits will transfer and from which institutions to accept them are totally up to the discretion of the receiving institution. Only credits applicable to the student’s program at the receiving institution have a chance of being accepted and credits from courses with a grade below C will almost never be accepted. Students will find that Trinity College credits will transfer without any problem to other accredited Bible colleges and to some regionally accredited colleges as well. Some institutions do have policies that exclude the transfer of credit from institutions with a different accreditation from their own. This means that some regionally accredited colleges will not accept credits from nationally accredited Bible colleges. Students intending to transfer to a regionally accredited institution should check with that institution about its transfer policies.

Trinity College is also part of the Higher Education Transfer Alliance, an association of colleges and universities that have agreed that transfer decisions will not be based solely on the source of an institution’s accreditation. Trinity is also part of Florida’s Statewide Course Numbering System in which many of our general education courses are enrolled. This means that those courses will transfer to state colleges and universities in Florida as long as they fit into the academic program selected by the student. Courses that are in the system are clearly marked in the Catalog.

Trinity College has made the decision that, even though regional accreditation offers no guarantee of Christian behavioral standards or development of a Christian worldview, two distinct qualities of Bible college education, we will still accept academic credits from regionally accredited institutions.

Students who wish to pursue graduate education at the major evangelical seminaries will find that their accredited Trinity College degree is widely accepted. Students from Trinity have gone on to or would be accepted at institutions such as Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, Dallas Theological Seminary, Reformed Theological Seminary, Asbury Theological Seminary, Alliance Theological Seminary, and others. In addition, Trinity students have gone on to graduate study in non-theological areas at institutions ranging from USF to Stetson Law School.

Trinitycollege (talk) 16:14, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

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