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WSCUC Resources
About WSCUC
WASC Senior College and University Commission (WSCUC) is a California nonprofit public benefit corporation established for the purposes of accrediting senior (bachelor’s degrees and above) colleges and universities. Its genesis lies in the Western College Association, founded in 1924. WSCUC was formed on July 1, 1962, to evaluate and accredit schools, colleges, and universities in California, Hawaii, Guam, American Samoa, the Federated States of Micronesia, the Republic of Palau, and the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands. Today WSCUC accredits institutions located anywhere in the United States and around the world. WSCUC is recognized by the U.S. Department of Education as a reliable authority concerning the quality of education provided by member institutions of higher education offering baccalaureate and post-baccalaureate degrees.
WSCUC conducts cyclical reviews of colleges and universities to ensure, institutional accountability, compliance with federal regulations, and to provide support for institutional improvement. The Commission's stated goals (wascsenior.org) are to promote institutional engagement with issues of educational effectiveness and student learning, develop a culture of evidence that informs decision-making, and foster active interchange among public and private institutions.
WSCUC -- 1080 Marina Village Parkway, Suite #500, Alameda, CA 94501 -- (510) 748-9001
To view Sacramento State’s accreditation information, visit the Sac State's Profile page to access the institutional profile, which includes details about accreditation status, reports, location, programs, and review cycles.
WSCUC 2023 Handbook
The WSCUC 2023 Handbook of Accreditation establishes the foundational standards and principles for institutions seeking accreditation with the WASC Senior College and University Commission. The Handbook contains four Standards, further defined by Criteria for Review (CFRs), that form the basis for institutional review and express a commitment to student success for all students, ensure institutional quality, and promote cultures of evidence and improvement WSCUC.
Approved in June 2023, the handbook became mandatory for all institutional reviews beginning after September 1, 2024, with a renewed emphasis on placing students at the center of accreditation processes. It serves as a comprehensive guide for institutions, peer reviewers, and the Commission throughout the evaluation process.
WSCUC Standards & CFR's
The WSCUC four Standards consist of broad, holistic statements reflecting widely accepted good practices in higher education.
- Standard 1 address defining institutional purposes and ensuring educational objectives.
- Standard 2 focuses on achieving educational objectives through core functions of teaching, learning, and scholarship.
- Standard 3 concerns developing and applying resources and organizational structures to ensure quality and sustainability.
- Standard 4 emphasizes creating an organization committed to quality assurance, institutional learning, and improvement.
These Standards are further defined by 39 Criteria for Review that provide more specific statements about institutional functioning and serve as the basis for institutional review by peer evaluators and the Commission.
Key Indicator Dashboards (KID)
The WSCUC Kid Indicators Dashboard (KID) is a data visualization tool that provides metrics and context on the educational environments and outcomes of WSCUC-accredited institutions. The dashboard’s interactive features offer institutions, peer reviewers, and the public access to a wide range of metrics such as enrollment, retention, completion, and graduation rates. KID is part of WSCUC’s “better conversations, better data” initiative, which aims to strengthen the accreditation process through an evidence- and inquiry-based approach. KID draws from federal data sets, including the College Scorecard, and presents multiple years with comparisons to national, peer, and WSCUC averages.
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