# Looking for the names of university accreditation standards for languages, engineering, business ... **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [October 25, 2014, 7:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/looking-for-the-names-of-university-accreditation-standards-for-languages-engineering-business/702432 "2014-10-25T07:44:39Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![davidmich](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e56c9b/32.png) [@davidmich](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/davidmich)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2014, 7:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/looking-for-the-names-of-university-accreditation-standards-for-languages-engineering-business/702432/1 "2014-10-25T07:44:39Z")
What are the names of the universally recognized university accreditation standards for 1. languages 2. engineering 3. business 4. science What are the best criteria (in your opinion) for choosing universities (from the above categories). I’m asking because published lists in newspapers tend to be rather biased. I look forward to your feedback. I would like to hear about US as well as European universities. I look forward to your feedback. davidmich ---
**Author:** ![davidmich](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e56c9b/32.png) [@davidmich](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/davidmich)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2014, 8:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/looking-for-the-names-of-university-accreditation-standards-for-languages-engineering-business/702432/2 "2014-10-25T08:00:18Z")
> **[List of recognized higher education accreditation organizations](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_recognized_higher_education_accreditation_organizations)** > > This is a list of recognized higher education related accreditation organizations. The list includes agencies and organizations that play a role in higher education accreditation and are recognized by the appropriate governmental authorities. > The International Network for Quality Assurance Agencies in Higher Education (INQAAHE) is a global association of quality assurance organizations, both governmental and non-governmental. It > was founded in 1991 with 8 member organizations and now has over... business (National Business Education Accreditation Council (NBEAC) languages (Commission on English Language Program Accreditation Commission on Massage Therapy Accreditation) engineering (Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology (ABET) science (National Accrediting Agency for Clinical Laboratory Sciences (NAACLS)) ---
**Author:** ![jimbuff314](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/c57346/32.png) [@jimbuff314](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jimbuff314)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2014, 9:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/looking-for-the-names-of-university-accreditation-standards-for-languages-engineering-business/702432/3 "2014-10-25T09:05:38Z")
I must confess I am somewhat muddled upon reading your OP and your reply to it. At some personal risk (this being the General Questions forum) I feel compelled to inquire as to whether or not your reply to your OP answered all of the questions you posed in your OP. I do note a rather extraneous appearing outlier in your reply of a list of accrediting organizations which is occupying the precise middle - the Commission on Massage Therapy Accreditation. Being as familiar with myself and my proclivities as I am, I am going to have to select this for my criterion. I am somewhat embarrassed to divulge that you may find my bias in this regard to be the equal of the newspapers you were so kind as to mention. ---
**Author:** ![davidmich](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e56c9b/32.png) [@davidmich](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/davidmich)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2014, 9:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/looking-for-the-names-of-university-accreditation-standards-for-languages-engineering-business/702432/4 "2014-10-25T09:53:27Z")
I believe I selected the correct accreditations below. But if someone has more experience in this area I’d like to hear from him/her. [List - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of)…\_organizations business (National Business Education Accreditation Council (NBEAC) languages (Commission on English Language Program Accreditation Commission on Massage Therapy Accreditation) engineering (Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology (ABET) science (National Accrediting Agency for Clinical Laboratory Sciences (NAACLS)) ---
**Author:** ![ftg](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ftg/32/2801_2.png) [@ftg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ftg)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2014, 3:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/looking-for-the-names-of-university-accreditation-standards-for-languages-engineering-business/702432/5 "2014-10-25T15:49:25Z")
The [regional accreditation boards](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_recognized_higher_education_accreditation_organizations#Regional_accreditors) take care of most fields in the US. They accredit colleges (among others). They review all degree granting programs at the college so each department is included by default. If you are studying a standard Liberal Arts, Science, Social Science field, that’s all you want or need in almost all cases. There are specialized accreditation for some fields. Engineering is the biggest one with individual accreditation. And those are Really Important. Some fields do have accreditation but a lot of places ignore them since they are not worth the hassle. The ACM accreditation program for Computer Science, for example, is not well respected and many departments don’t bother with it. (Ex-CS prof, so I’ve been there, hated that.) The US Dept. of Educ. has a _long_ list of valid accrediting bodies. Many of them quite skeevy. This is why those “schools” that are just student loan sinks stay in business. Note that having a regional accreditation isn’t always a guarantee. Some of the student loan scam places have bought out a failing real college with accreditation and assumed that accreditation for the whole place. (Getting regional accreditation is a big hassle. Keeping it is fairly simple. But one place I worked botched that and had to start over. It was a big stink.) ---
**Author:** ![Lsura](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7993a0/32.png) [@Lsura](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lsura)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2014, 9:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/looking-for-the-names-of-university-accreditation-standards-for-languages-engineering-business/702432/6 "2014-10-25T21:44:33Z")
For schools of business, the [AACSB (Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business)](http://www.aacsb.edu/en/about/) is better thought of than the one you linked to, at least for 4 year and master’s granting institutions. But the school itself still has to be accredited, as **ftg** said. For example, the university where I work is accredited by [SACS](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southern_Association_of_Colleges_and_Schools)overall, but programs within the university may then be accredited by other organizations, like the AACSB. ---
**Author:** ![IvoryTowerDenizen](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ivorytowerdenizen/32/17937_2.png) [@IvoryTowerDenizen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IvoryTowerDenizen)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2014, 11:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/looking-for-the-names-of-university-accreditation-standards-for-languages-engineering-business/702432/7 "2014-10-25T23:03:01Z")
> [@davidmich](#): > > [List of recognized higher education accreditation organizations - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_recognized_higher_education_accreditation_organizations) > > business (National Business Education Accreditation Council (NBEAC) > languages (Commission on English Language Program Accreditation > Commission on Massage Therapy Accreditation) > engineering (Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology (ABET) > science (National Accrediting Agency for Clinical Laboratory Sciences (NAACLS)) It will vary by specific programs and not all degree programs have national accreditation. In the sciences, applied programs like Clinical lab sciences, medical imaging, nursing etc can be accredited. Basic sciences, such as a bio degree, won’t be. However the university as a whole will be regionally accredited (which is more relevant than national accreditation) indicating that all theIr academic programs meet minimum acceptable standards. ---
**Author:** ![davidmich](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e56c9b/32.png) [@davidmich](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/davidmich)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2014, 11:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/looking-for-the-names-of-university-accreditation-standards-for-languages-engineering-business/702432/8 "2014-10-25T23:24:14Z")
" Engineering is the biggest one with individual accreditation. And those are Really Important." ftg, Can you suggest some important accreditations for post-graduate engineers? ---
**Author:** ![davidmich](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e56c9b/32.png) [@davidmich](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/davidmich)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2014, 7:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/looking-for-the-names-of-university-accreditation-standards-for-languages-engineering-business/702432/9 "2014-10-27T07:20:35Z")
> **[Most Prestigious Engineering Schools](https://talk.collegeconfidential.com/t/most-prestigious-engineering-schools/620188)** > > I’m not trying to initiate a 25 page debate. But what are the top five (or more) most prestigious engineering schools in your opinion? Example: MIT Stanford Caltech UC Berkeley University of Illinois - UC "The NAE is a member of the National Academies, which includes the NAE, the National Academy of Sciences (NAS), the Institute of Medicine (IOM), and the National Research Council (NRC) – which serves as the principal operating arm of the academies. Engineering program activities of the National Academies cut across the many operational units of these four organizations, although most projects are executed by units of the NRC. The NAE has more than 2,000 peer-elected members and foreign associates, senior professionals in business, academia, and government who are among the world’s most accomplished engineers. They provide the leadership and expertise for numerous projects focused on the relationships between engineering, technology, and the quality of life." ---
**Author:** ![zut](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zut/32/2875_2.png) [@zut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zut)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2014, 12:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/looking-for-the-names-of-university-accreditation-standards-for-languages-engineering-business/702432/10 "2014-10-27T12:44:19Z")
> [@davidmich](#): > > What are the names of the universally recognized university accreditation standards for > > 1. languages > 2. engineering > 3. business > 4. science > What are the best criteria (in your opinion) for choosing universities (from the above categories). I’m asking because published lists in newspapers tend to be rather biased. > I look forward to your feedback. I would like to hear about US as well as European universities. I look forward to your feedback. > davidmich You’re asking two questions here: (1) What are the names of the accreditation bodies for these four subjects? (2) What are the best criteria for choosing a university? These are two different questions, and they don’t really overlap very much, so let me break it down. My area of exertise is in engineering, so I will concentrate on that. (1) What is the name of the accreditation body for engineering? As you suspected, ABET (Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology) is the organization that accredits engineering programs _in the US_. Essentially, any _undergraduate_ engineering program in the US of note is accredited by (or has plans to gain accreditation from) ABET. Additional points: - Accreditation is a yes/no decision, so there are no “levels” of accreditation that you can use to rank programs. - Athough many programs outside the US are accredited by ABET, these are typically programs who send a significant proportion of their graduates to industry or post-graduate school in the US. There are plenty of world-class engineering programs (in Europe, particularly) which are not accredited by ABET. - Although ABET can and does accredit graduate-level programs, this is far from the norm, and most graduate-level engineering programs are _not_ accredited by ABET. (2) What are the best criteria for choosing a university? Again speaking about engineering, the real answer is: it depends on what criteria are important to you, and the subject you want to study. In general, the programs with the best reputation attract the best faculty and the best students, who go on to have great careers, which enhance the program’s reputation, so they can attract the best faculty and the best students. In other words, in the absence of any specific wants from you, the most general ranking is by reputation, which is by definition subjective. Off the top of my head, I would say that of US engineering schools, the most prestigious is MIT, followed by (in no particular order) Cal Tech, Stanford, Michigan, Illinois, Cal Berkeley, and Georgia Tech. You might throw Purdue, Cornell, Virginia Tech, or Carnegie Mellon into the mix also. This, of course, is US-centric, and ignores the to-notch Eropean universities. > [@davidmich](#): > > " Engineering is the biggest one with individual accreditation. And those are Really Important." > > ftg, Can you suggest some important accreditations for post-graduate engineers? (a) There really aren’t any; at least, in the form that you can use to choose a program. (b) Why do you want to know? > [@davidmich](#): > > [Most Prestigious Engineering Schools - Engineering Majors - College Confidential Forums](http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/engineering-majors/636300-most-prestigious-engineering-schools.html) > > “The NAE is a member of the National Academies, …” The NAE is not an accrediting body. Your link just has a headcount of NAE members working at various universities. That’s an attempt to make an objective ranking of engineering programs, but a really narrow one, and one that aso refelctes the size of the college. ---
**Author:** ![davidmich](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e56c9b/32.png) [@davidmich](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/davidmich)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2014, 2:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/looking-for-the-names-of-university-accreditation-standards-for-languages-engineering-business/702432/11 "2014-10-27T14:13:20Z")
“Although ABET can and does accredit graduate-level programs, this is far from the norm, and most graduate-level engineering programs are not accredited by ABET.” Thanks zut. This is what I was after. When it comes to Ivy League and long-standing top-ranked universities, accreditation is never really questioned. What prompted my question was the accreditation of lower tier but good universities and colleges, whose reputation may not be that well known. ABET for engineering SACS/AACSB/ACBSP for Business /EMBA programs NAACLS for Science Language (Linguistics) Not sure which accreditation standards are the best in this field > **[Best Master Degrees in Linguistics 2023](https://www.masterstudies.com/masters-degree/linguistics)** > > Contact Schools Directly - Compare 103 Master Degrees in Linguistics 2023