{"id":41156,"date":"2014-07-10T04:00:47","date_gmt":"2014-07-09T18:00:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/?p=41156"},"modified":"2014-07-10T04:00:47","modified_gmt":"2014-07-09T18:00:47","slug":"nmc-gets-6-year-accreditation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/nmc-gets-6-year-accreditation\/","title":{"rendered":"NMC gets 6-year accreditation"},"content":{"rendered":"

With a banner draped behind them reading \u201cBELIEVE,\u201d Northern Marianas College officials announced yesterday that the institution has been approved a six-year accreditation with the WASC Senior College and University Commission, which now allows it to expand its offering of four-year degree programs.<\/p>\n

\"Northern<\/a>
Northern Marianas College\u2019s Board of Regents chair Frank Rabauliman and acting president Jacqueline Che wait to begin the news briefing yesterday. NMC has been granted initial accreditation under the WASC Senior College and University Commission.(Dennis B. Chan)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cWe are happy to announce that we received notice from [the Western Association of Schools and Colleges] yesterday morning and they have granted us initial accreditation for six years,\u201d said acting NMC president Jacqueline Che. \u201cAlso, they have approved our proposal to offer a bachelor\u2019s of business management this fall 2014 semester.\u201d<\/p>\n

The room erupted in cheers and applause after the announcement.<\/p>\n

The college\u2019s accreditation used to be under WASC\u2019s Accrediting Commission for Community and Junior Colleges.<\/p>\n

The new accreditation under the Senior Commission now allows the college to offer more four-year degree programs. Right now, its only four-year degree program is the bachelor\u2019s degree in education.<\/p>\n

In its letter to the college, the Senior Commission commended NMC\u2019s dedicated faculty, staff, and administrators for their commitment to the success of their students despite the financially pressed and geographically-isolated environment of the college.<\/p>\n

The six-year accreditation requires the college to submit only one interim report, according to Amanda Allen, NMC\u2019s accreditation liaison officer and director of Distance Education.<\/p>\n

The report will address four areas that the college is committed to build upon: faculty roles and development, research and data-supported decisions, assessment of learning, and student success.<\/p>\n

Allen said that while there is a new bachelor\u2019s degree being offered, the college retains its core identity as community college. She said the college\u2019s bachelor\u2019s degree in business management along with its bachelor\u2019s degree in education \u201cwill just be one step up.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re not changing our identity, we\u2019re just growing.\u201d<\/p>\n

Che noted that while colleges usually take fours years to gain initial accreditation, the college did so in less than four months.<\/p>\n

Within a month after receiving affirmation of its accreditation with the Junior Commission, the college quickly set the foundation to move toward the Senior Commission, submitting its subsidy report in March, hosting a site visit in April, and yesterday morning receiving news of its affirmed accreditation.<\/p>\n

Che thanked the \u201camazing community of faculty, staff, and students who worked so hard to be a part of this.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was definitely a team effort,\u201d Allen said.<\/p>\n

Board of Regents chair Frank Rabauliman said it is interesting to look back at the events leading up to their success, noting that after U.S. Department of Education\u2019s citation against NMC for its dual accreditation last year, the college worked first to reaffirm itself under ACCJC, and then secondly move forwards in its transition to the Senior Commission.<\/p>\n

He thanked his fellow board members for their decision to go ahead with the implementation of a new four-year bachelor\u2019s degree in business management. The degree will be available to current and new students this fall semester.<\/p>\n

For access to the Senior Commission action letter, see the Resource Documents page at www.marianas.edu. (By DENNIS B. CHAN, dennis_chan@saipantribune.com)<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

With a banner draped behind them reading \u201cBELIEVE,\u201d Northern Marianas College officials announced yesterday that…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":47,"featured_media":41158,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[94,4],"tags":[56,37,69,856],"class_list":["post-41156","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-headlines","category-local-news","tag-business-3","tag-education-2","tag-nmc","tag-senior-commission"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41156","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/47"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=41156"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41156\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/41158"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=41156"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=41156"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=41156"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}