While it’s unlikely that the 2024 presidential election will hinge on the finer points of higher education policy, the stakes for America’s colleges and universities could hardly be higher.
Typical university groupthink aside, the higher education establishment has good reason to root for Vice President Kamala Harris. Her administration would continue President Joe Biden’s project of destroying the student loan system and transforming higher ed into an infinitely-subsidized entitlement program without any incentive for effectiveness. A Trump administration, on the other hand, could actually prioritize the interests of students.
In an Agenda47 video, former President Donald Trump homed in on higher ed accreditation, calling it his “secret weapon” for reform.
For those unfamiliar, accreditors are non-profit organizations that the Department of Education delegates the duty of green- or red-lighting federal financial assistance. No new college can launch without their green light. No existing college could survive their red light. They act as a cartel, preventing new competitors from entering the market and enforcing DEI ideology on existing institutions. They’ll say that they ensure quality, but there’s no evidence or reason to think that, even though there’s plenty of evidence and reason to think they drive administrative bloat by requiring reams of useless paperwork.
Trump’s idea is to fire the accreditors and approve new ones that would be open to new institutions, push back on diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI), and enforce accountability based on tests demonstrating student learning gains.
Taken literally, Trump’s proposal would be difficult to execute without an act of Congress. It would invite years’ worth of litigation with uncertain-to-dim prospects for success. And if it were to pass, any law cleanly authorizing these reforms would also provide a blank check for a future Democrat administration to do the exact same thing in reverse.
Taken seriously, however, Trump’s proposal points to an executable agenda that would accomplish most of his policy priorities. Trump can’t simply tell all the accreditors, “You’re Fired!” But his Department of Education could essentially destroy one and defang the rest.
Last year, Florida filed a lawsuit against the Biden administration, arguing that the entire system of accreditation is unconstitutional because it effectively gives the power of the purse, which the Constitution reserves for Congress, to an unaccountable non-profit organization. Florida’s colleges are largely accredited by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges (SACSCOC). SACSCOC has been perhaps the most offensive and pro-DEI of all the accreditors, creating rare waves of Wall Street Journal headlines for its campaign against the University of North Carolina’s new college of civic thought.
Other red states could join Florida. Then the Trump administration could settle the lawsuit by stipulating that all parties are free to find another accreditor on an expedited basis. SACSCOC would be basically demolished, and other accreditors would be chastened against further DEI-driven intrusion.
The Trump Department of Education could also expedite the approval of new accreditors. Perhaps the southern public universities currently reporting to SACSCOC could form their own accreditor — one further assured to take a light administrative touch and not push DEI in any form.
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Other mission-driven accreditors, including results-based accreditors with a particular emphasis on accrediting start-up colleges and workforce-readiness institutions, could apply for ED approval. As things stand now, civil servants in the Department of Education can essentially throttle the approval process by requiring all sorts of terms and conditions that have negligible basis in statute. But if the Trump administration implements Schedule F – making civil servants’ job performance matter for whether they get to keep their jobs — Trump’s Secretary of Education could direct those civil servants to proceed with all deliberate haste.
While it’s unlikely that the Trump administration could simply replace DEI-accreditors with MAGA-accreditors, especially without Congress’s help, it could effectively address most of the major problems with the current accreditation system. It could dramatically reduce its administrative burden, neutralize its ideological imperative, and open the whole sector to new, results-driven institutions. This could decrease the costs and increase the return on investment for the higher education system writ large.
Max Eden is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.