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  1. #21
    Join Date
    Jan 2008
    Posts
    20

    Default Re: Arbitrary Degree Accreditation Requirement

    Quote Quoting mitousmom
    View Post
    The statement in the code that a "doctoral degree in X from a college or university approved by the Secretary" isn't inconsistent with the requirement that the degree must be from an accredited program. The later statement is simply more descriptive. It indicates the colleges or universities approved the Secretary are ones with accredited doctoral programs.

    Federal law doesn't require that hiring standards or requirements "be tied to (i.e., predictive of) job performance," unless they have an adverse impact on a group or groups protected under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act. EEOC, DOL and DOJ have issued guidance on this subject under the UNIFORM GUIDELINES ON EMPLOYEE SELECTION PROCEDURES (UGESP). However, nothing you have described appears to fall under UGESP.
    <<The statement in the code that a "doctoral degree in X from a college or university approved by the Secretary" isn't inconsistent with the requirement that the degree must be from an accredited program.>>

    That is correct. Here are the two statements for comparison:

    1. From the U.S. Code: Applicants “must hold a doctoral degree in X from a college or university approved by the Secretary."

    2. From the agency handbook: Applicants “must have a doctoral degree in X from a graduate program in X accredited by the XYZ Association.”

    The first is law, the second, policy. The second is, as you say, more descriptive. It is also stricter and therefore more restrictive. The problem with the restriction is that it excludes certain well qualified individuals and all graduates of programs in foreign countries (the accrediting body only accredits U.S. programs). A colleague of mine could not work for the agency (if she wanted to) because she got her education and training in England. Excepting the agency I’m talking about, I am not aware of any agency, institution, or governing body that does not take exceptional factors into consideration via waivers, exceptions, grandfather clauses, certificates of equivalence, and so on. National security is not an issue here.

    I recently described the situation by voicemail to the Director of Accreditation at XYZ Association, the accrediting body. Her voicemail reply: “Accreditation is for the program and says nothing about the individual. The remedy, if you will, for a person having been in a program that is not accredited is the ability of the individual to be licensed, which is the credential for service delivery.” Her reply will not win any awards, I know, but what she seems to be saying is that licensure implies competence, whereas accreditation does not. In others words, licensure, not accreditation, is the standard indicator of professional competence.

    << Federal law doesn't require that hiring standards or requirements "be tied to (i.e., predictive of) job performance," unless they have an adverse impact on a group or groups protected under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act.>>

    No protected groups here, but if the agency’s explicit goal is to hire top performers, i.e., persons who can do A, B, and C, it has to be able to show that its hiring process selects persons who can do A, B, and C, and weeds out persons who cannot. If a variable it uses to select employees is not empirically related to the ability to do A, B, and C, how can it use that variable?

    I want to thank members of this forum for their replies, and especially the person (moderator?) who re-titled the thread “Arbitrary Degree Accreditation Requirement,” because I think that precisely summarizes the issue:

    Is there a problem with the accreditation requirement if it excludes eminently well qualified individuals and individuals not educated and trained in the U.S.?

  2. #22
    Join Date
    Mar 2007
    Posts
    9,096

    Default Re: Arbitrary Degree Accreditation Requirement

    I really don't understand the problem in understanding this.

    According to your own post,

    1. From the U.S. Code: Applicants “must hold a doctoral degree in X from a college or university approved by the Secretary."
    Your college or university was not approved.

    Should we go through this again?

  3. #23
    Join Date
    Jan 2008
    Posts
    20

    Default Re: Arbitrary Degree Accreditation Requirement

    Quote Quoting cyjeff
    View Post
    I really don't understand the problem in understanding this.
    According to your own post, Your college or university was not approved.
    Should we go through this again?
    <<I really don't understand the problem in understanding this.>>

    I can tell.

    <<According to your own post, your college or university was not approved.>>

    "Approved" is the language of the Code, which states that applicants must hold a degree from a college or university approved by the Secretary. Please direct me to where I said that my education was inconsistent with the Code.

    Maybe this will help: (1) The Secretary is a Cabinet official, (2) The department he oversees has three subdivisions, (3) The agency in question is one of these, (4) The agency itself created the accreditation requirement, (5) The Secretary does not have a list of approved colleges and universities.

    If the agency were entirely comfortable with its requirements for the position, it would not need to cite the authority for them differently in its announcements. Sometimes it cites the U.S. Code by reference only, other times it cites and quotes the Code (“doctoral degree in X from a college or university approved by the Secretary”), other times it cites the Code and includes interpretations of the Code (titled “Interpretations” in the announcement), and other times it cites the Code and lists the requirements contained in its handbook, which is where the accreditation requirement resides. The accreditation requirement is not in the Code. It is only in the agency handbook.

    There is, of course, a view I haven't considered, and that is that the Secretary may very well approve of, and perhaps even encourage, the accreditation requirement, irrespective of when a person got her degree. But that doesn't change the requirement's practical result or my position, and it doesn't mean the requirement cannot or should not be challenged.

    <<Should we go through this again?>>

    Not if you can tell me: If a person were to challenge this, what would be the basis for a challenge, however far-fetched or hopeless it might be?

  4. #24
    Join Date
    Dec 2005
    Posts
    200

    Default Re: Arbitrary Degree Accreditation Requirement

    Is there a problem with the accreditation requirement if it excludes eminently well qualified individuals and individuals not educated and trained in the U.S.?
    The agency involved obviously doesn't consider those with a degree from an unaccredited college or university as eminently well qualified and your arguments are unlikely to change the agency's requirement. I personally like the idea of accredited programs which show that the institutions educating students or providing training meet some uniform standards.

    You've found employment at an employer that considers you qualified for the job. It's time to move on.

    You have no basis for a challenge. You would be suing the federal govenment and it has to give you permission to sue it. I don't know that it has for challenges to hiring standards unless the matter falls under UGESP.

    For the purposes of the code, the secretary is the agency. The agency has told you that it has consistently applied the requirement since the 1980's and has not granted any exceptions. Your education doesn't meet the requirements of the code because your college or university wasn't approved by the secretary.

    It might be useful to you if you received communication from the agency identifying those college or doctoral programs approved by the Secretary for your job. If you see in writing that the Secretary didn't approve your institution because it wasn't accredited, maybe you can accept the inevitable.

  5. #25
    Join Date
    Jan 2008
    Posts
    20

    Default Re: Arbitrary Degree Accreditation Requirement

    Quote Quoting mitousmom
    View Post
    The agency involved, etc.
    <<The agency involved obviously doesn't consider those with a degree from an unaccredited college or university as eminently well qualified and your arguments are unlikely to change the agency's requirement. I personally like the idea of accredited programs which show that the institutions educating students or providing training meet some uniform standards.>>

    Those who interviewed me for the position considered me to be an exceptional candidate and said so. My program (not university; you've mixed Code and agency language) has been accredited since the early 1990s, so it has been approved for a long time, if accredited by the agency means the same as approved by the Secretary (it's not at all clear to me that it does). My program received accreditation not long after I graduated. In the 1980s, when I attended, there were competing academic models and accreditation bodies, and no one really knew which would win out. Even after a program was on board for the entities that prevailed, it took time via site visits and the like to get the stamp of approval. Accreditation by XYZ Association, as opposed to other bodies, wasn't a deal-breaker, or even that big a deal, back then

    <<For the purposes of the code, the secretary is the agency.>>

    Agreed, but the agency is not the Secretary unless he says it is.>>

    <<The agency has told you that it has consistently applied the requirement since the 1980's and has not granted any exceptions.>>

    A representative of the agency told me that, yes, but I'll bet I could find a few Brownies if I snooped around. I've been in this world long enough to know that "we've always done things that way" is an eyebrow-raising tough sell that doesn't fly well.

    <<It might be useful to you if you received communication from the agency identifying those college or doctoral programs approved by the Secretary for your job.>>

    I asked my senator's office last week to contact the department (not the agency) to find out if the Secretary maintains such a list, and, if not, how one could tell if a program is approved or not approved by the Secretary. I'll give them a few more days and then a nudge.

    <<If you see in writing that the Secretary didn't approve your institution because it wasn't accredited, maybe you can accept the inevitable.>>

    I think I've stated my case as best I can. Thanks to all who replied. You've forced me to clarify my thinking about this, and I owe you good language for that. I'm going to take a break from posting for now and shift to lurking mode. I'll let y'all know if anything earth-shattering happens.

  6. #26
    Join Date
    May 2008
    Location
    Louisville, KY
    Posts
    1,877

    Default Re: Arbitrary Degree Accreditation Requirement

    You have to have graduated from a program that was accredited at the time you graduated.

    Go back to school. Perhaps the place you got your original education will give you a break with some credits and costs etc.

    That agency is not going to change their rules for you. (even if the rules are convoluted and even if they contradict each other.) It works for them.

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