Benefits of the COCNASC include support of Northwestern colleges and universities, accreditation of such institutions, and the advantageous results of such support and accreditation for students.
One could probably contrive a million benefits of an accreditation organization, but there are two that reign primary. Of course, they benefit the institution and interestingly enough, mostly financially. They also benefit the students, which should be rather obvious. In this way, they improve American education overall.
Benefits to Northwestern Schools
The COCNASC deals with schools in Alaska, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, Oregon, Utah, and Washington. These schools are aware of the COCNASC and its accreditation process and thus, unlike unsupervised children, will remain on their P’s and Q’s. This isn’t to say that every one of these schools are models of pedagogical perfection and know no wrong, but it does indicate that these schools are far more likely to abide to code. This often results in a highly operational school, but post accreditation, it means something far more important to the school in general.
Institutions that receive nationally recognized accreditation are world-renowned. An accredited institution is one that is guaranteed to have a functional curriculum, operational infrastructure, an effective administration, and an expert faculty. For schools, this means that they will be considered for attendance by students the world over, given that they have been exhaustively reviewed and conclusively accepted as an accredited institution. This inevitably results in a larger applicant pool that includes more high-performing students. Furthermore, it avails:
- Access to a support system comprised of various institutions that aid in the continued observance of local, state, national, and international requirements
- Professional development opportunities such as annual conferences, state workshops
- Technical assistance to optimize improvement efforts
- Access to guides, handbooks, primers, resources, tools, and websites that aid in institutional improvement initiatives as well as accreditation maintenance.