Fisk University, showing a fiscal bounce from a recent windfall of money generated by the sale of half ownership in its treasured art collection, filed a new “monitoring” report this month with the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools (SACS), hoping the document and a SACS special committee visit next month will set the stage for the institution to win a clean bill of health from SACS in December.
The monitoring report was filed as part of Fisk’s efforts to persuade the powerful higher education accrediting agency to remove Fisk from probation, a status it has held since December 2011 following determinations by SACS dating to 2009 that the university has failed to comply with a growing shopping list of key criteria that make up part of SACS’ voluminous Principles of Accreditation.
The Principles, a check list akin to a thorough home or automobile inspection, are standards by which the hundreds of SACS member colleges across the South are measured to assess whether an institution merits accreditation.
In its most recent assessment of Fisk, in December 2011, SACS determined Fisk should be placed on probation due to lingering questions SACS has about the university’s financial stability and controls, the caliber of its governance board and administrative and academic leadership and compliance with the federal government’s Title IV programs that, among other things, aid historically Black colleges and universities.
Neither Fisk nor SACS will disclose or discuss monitoring reports.
At next December’s scheduled meeting of the SACS Commission on Colleges, the panel has several options. It could accept Fisk’s report, remove it from probation and reaffirm its accreditation for the standard period of 10 years or decide the university is still in non-compliance and take the unusual step of extending its probation for a third year. It could also decide to strip Fisk of its accreditation.
Accreditation is essential to the viability of tuition-driven colleges and universities as the federal government does not dispense student aid funds to unaccredited institutions.
