[Vision2020] Academic Accreditation and New St. Andrews College

[Saundra Lund]

Hi Dr. Gier,

Thanks for the analysis, but I think we have simply been confused.  We've
been looking at the wrong academic excellence & accreditation standards!
Silly us ;-)

NSA *is* accredited by the Association of Classical & Christian Schools
(ACCS), FWIW.  This apparently happened in June, 1998.  That's not the kind
of accreditation I'd be looking for in an institution of higher learning,
but hey . . . that's just me and I'm quite pleased with the education I
received at the UI  :-)

There's all kinds of ACCS information available online
(http://www.accsedu.org/) and from Cannon Press (an ACCS affiliate member,
of course).  I've not wanted to shell out the money for their Accreditation
Handbook (for all I know, perhaps it only applied to primary and secondary
schools), but I did find some enlightening information online in their FAQ
section:
http://www.accsedu.org/pageview.asp?PageID=5421
"Q: Do I need a degree in education to teach in a classical Christian
school? Are there any degrees I should pursue, books I should read, or
programs I should participate in that would make me a better teacher in the
future?

A: A degree in education is NOT required by most ACCS schools. ***Most
colleges and universities teach was is antithetical to a Biblical view of
education, so it would not be time well invested.*** It would require you to
unlearn much of what you learned in college to be able to teach in a
classical and Christian school.  This is not to say that a person with such
a degree would not be hired, but such an education is not necessarily viewed
as a plus. <snip>
[Note:  emphasis is mine.  There's obviously a typo in the emphasized
sentence, but I think the meaning is still clear, typo and all.  SL]

Q: Will classical and Christian schools hire someone with a teaching degree?
Do I need a masters degree before I can teach? 

A: Most classical and Christian schools will hire someone with or without a
teaching degree. There are a few ACCS schools that are looking for folks
with PhD after their name, but a PhD ( or a Master's degree) is not an
indicator that someone can teach. Degrees may be beneficial in demonstrating
your depth of knowledge in your subject, and it is not discouraged, but it
is not essential for being able to teach in most ACCS schools."

And, of course, essential reading includes:
Recovering the Lost Tools of Learning by Doug Wilson
Repairing the Ruins edited by Doug Wilson
The Case for Classical Christian Education by Doug Wilson

Once we know which "standard" NSA had followed, I think that goes far to
address your list of concerns  ;-)

Of course, that doesn't address Dean Atwood's lack of clarity in his Letter
to the Editor. 


Saundra Lund
Moscow, ID

The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good people to do
nothing.
-Edmund Burke 

-----Original Message-----
From: vision2020-admin@moscow.com [mailto:vision2020-admin@moscow.com] On
Behalf Of Nicholas Gier
Sent: Thursday, December 18, 2003 2:10 PM
To: vision2020@moscow.com
Subject: [Vision2020] Academic Accreditation and New St. Andrews College


In a letter to the Daily News on May 22, Dean Roy Atwood was not very
transparent about the accreditation status of New St. Andrews College (NSA).
For those not familiar with the process of accreditation (that would be most
readers), Atwood gave the impression that his college was accredited by the
Council on Higher Education and the U. S. Department of Education.  These
organizations only recognize individual accrediting agencies; they are not
involved in accreditation at all.

Atwood failed to mention two facts: (1) NSA's accreditation agency is the
Transnational Association of Christian Schools and Colleges; and (2) NSA is
only a candidate for accreditation.  This agency lists only 30 schools on
its fully accredited list. Perhaps this agency has just begun business, but
it appears to be a very low level agency for academic recognition. None of
the good Christian liberal arts colleges are on this list. 

While disguising the identity of NSA's agency, Atwood does mention the
association by which he would prefer to be recognized, the one that does
represent good Christian liberal arts schools.  For example, only a couple
of schools in our Pacific Northwest Division of the American Academy of
Religion and Society for Biblical Literature (of which I'm outgoing
president) are on the Transnational list and all the rest are on other more
reputable lists.

As a former director of the UI School of Communication, Atwood knows what it
takes to be a respectable academic institution.  Atwood himself has an
outstanding publication record.  Most faculty members across the nation
provide online links for their CVs, but I have found nothing of the sort on
the NSA website.  Some of their books are listed, but no publisher is
mentioned, which leads me to assume that these books are from Canon Press.
Why does a good scholar such as Atwood not hold his faculty to the highest
scholarly standards?

Roy Atwood himself put the reputation of Canon Press into question by
admitting that the slavery booklet, published in the monograph series along
with Jones' racism piece, was not a scholarly work. The monograph series of
any press is usually the place where the best work is published. Presumably
the books published by Canon Press are not sent out for external review as
other good presses do as a matter of professional protocol. UI professors
are promoted on the basis of external peer review, and their publications
must contain a substantial number of books and articles reviewed by readers
not known to them.

If I were an outside reviewer of NSA's status as an academic institution, I
would be concerned about the following:

1. Two thirds of its faculty do not have PhDs.  A while back the faculty got
substantial pay increases, and I have heard that college fund raising has
been very successful.  NSA apparently has the resources to hire PhDs., but
chooses not to do so.

2. Two of the senior fellows do not have PhDs.  At the UI a PhD is required
at the lowest rank, assistant professor, and I know of only a very few
exceptional professors in the humanities anywhere who are full professors
without the PhD.

3. Although CVs are not available, it appears that most of the faculty's
published books are from Canon Press, Doug Wilson's own creation.  Wilson
has published his classical Christian school book by an outside publisher
and Peter Leithart has very respectable publication list, but I'm not sure
about the others.

4. Of special concern is the fact that Doug's Wilson brother, his son, and
his son-in-law are on the faculty, holding positions that should be filled
by PhDs .

The people at NSA claim that they uphold the highest traditions of academic
excellence, but parading around in caps and gowns, writing nasty critiques
of all philosophers and theologians who don't agree with them, sponsoring a
history conference with no professional historians as major speakers, and
misleading the public about its accreditation status, does not bode well for
their future as a truly academic institution.

P.S.  I e-mailed Atwood several weeks ago, giving him a chance to clarify
NSA's status in his own letter to the editor, but, as far as I know, he has
not done that.  I've not checked the Daily News on line for the past two
days, so perhaps he finally did.