Author’s Note:
This post is part of Fault Lines for 2026, a series examining areas where pressure has been building quietly across higher education and where 2026 is likely to make that pressure increasingly visible. Each post explores one fault line in depth. Together, they offer a broader view of the structural forces reshaping the sector and what those shifts demand of institutions going forward. For a general introduction to the series, see the opening post, and explore the other fault lines for 2026 to see how these dynamics connect. For much of 2025, accreditation looked quieter than many expected.
Fault Line #1 – Accreditation
Despite sharp rhetoric from Washington, proposed legislation, the creation of a new seven-state accreditation body, and widespread speculation about accreditation as a political lever or “secret weapon,” the system largely held. Oversight committee meetings produced more smoke than fire. Major accreditors retained federal recognition. Institutions experienced continuity rather than upheaval.
That calm, however, was never the same as stability.
As Laurie Shanderson and I argued in two Chronicle essays last year(The Weaponization of Accreditation, and Accreditation is Trump’s Secret Weapon), accreditation had already become one of the most powerful and contested levers in higher education governance, even if visible change lagged behind political pressure. What 2025 provided was not resolution, but runway.
As 2026 begins, multiple strands that developed quietly over the past year are now converging.
Leadership turnover begins to matter
Three major institutional accreditors entered 2026 with relatively new presidents who assumed their roles during 2025. These leaders are still early in their tenures, but no longer in listening mode alone.
- The Northwest Commission on Colleges and Universities appointed Dr. Selena Grace as president on July 14, 2025, following the retirement of the previous president earlier that year.
- The Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges installed Dr. Stephen L. Pruitt as president on August 1, 2025, succeeding Dr. Belle Wheelan after a twenty-year tenure.
- The WASC Senior College and University Commission welcomed Dr. A. Maria Toyoda as president and chief executive officer beginning in March 2025
Each of these leaders has signaled a willingness to revisit standards, processes, and institutional posture, often emphasizing efficiency, transparency, outcomes, and clearer differentiation among institutions. The significance here is not ideological alignment, but momentum. Leadership change creates space to act without being fully bound by legacy approaches.
At SACSCOC, that momentum is already visible. In his first-100-days agenda, President Pruitt outlined an explicit shift away from business as usual, including a comprehensive review of principles, a focus on streamlining and differentiation, and a recalibration of accountability alongside service. Most notably, at the December annual meeting he announced major changes to Substantive Change policy, eliminating more than half of existing categories and shifting several approvals from Board action to presidential and staff authority. For institutions, this is not abstract reform. It shortens timelines, reduces friction, and materially alters how institutional change is governed.
Alternative accreditors are no longer hypothetical
The Commission for Public Higher Education, formed by seven states and led by North Carolina and Florida, completed its first full year of activity in 2025. That milestone matters. New accreditors are not judged by their launch statements, but by whether institutions, states, and federal actors begin to treat them as credible quality authorities.
By late 2025, CPHE had already identified a first cohort of ten public institutions seeking recognition, including Appalachian State University, Chipola College, Columbus State University, Florida Atlantic University, Florida Polytechnic University, Georgia Southern University, North Carolina Central University, Texas A&M Kingsville, Texas A&M Texarkana, and the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. These institutions remain accredited by their current accreditor during the recognition process, but their participation signals something important. Alternative accreditation is no longer theoretical. Institutions are willing to test it.
CPHE is not alone. The National Association for Academic Excellence predates CPHE and represents an earlier example of how alternative accreditors can organize around mission, rigor, and governance values. Together, these efforts signal a widening door rather than a single experiment. As the Department of Education continues to lower barriers to recognition, additional entrants are likely. Even if only a small number ultimately gain traction, their presence alone reshapes the behavior and positioning of existing accreditors.
Federal oversight shifts from routine to contested
The Department of Education’s posture toward accreditation also shifted as 2025 closed, with changes that go beyond rhetoric and into governance.
Central to this shift is the National Advisory Committee on Institutional Quality and Integrity, commonly known as NACIQI. NACIQI is a federal advisory committee that reviews accrediting agencies and advises the Secretary of Education on whether those agencies should be recognized for purposes of federal student aid. While NACIQI does not make final decisions, its recommendations carry significant weight and often shape the Department’s actions. In effect, NACIQI functions as a gatekeeper between accreditors and federal recognition.
In November, the Department announced several new appointments to NACIQI, including members aligned with calls for increased competition among accreditors and greater emphasis on outcomes and institutional value. When NACIQI reconvened in December after canceled meetings earlier in the year, the proceedings revealed sharp partisan and philosophical divisions. Senior Department officials openly criticized accreditation as protectionist, overly burdensome, and insufficiently focused on outcomes, while emphasizing the need for competition from new accreditors.
At the same time, the Department announced plans to revise the Accreditation Handbook, signaling an emphasis on reduced burden, faster processes, and clearer alignment between accreditation, student outcomes, and institutional value. Legislative proposals aimed at constraining the scope of accreditor standards, particularly around perceived ideological requirements, further reinforced the message. Whether or not these bills advance, their presence underscores a broader reality. Accreditation is no longer treated as neutral infrastructure. It is openly contested terrain.
This shift is also occurring against the backdrop of a difficult and often uncomfortable reality. Many of the institutions that have closed abruptly in recent years did so with significant financial stress already present, yet without those risks being publicly flagged in advance by accreditors. That gap has fueled growing criticism about what accreditation actually signals to students, families, and policymakers, particularly when institutions remain accredited until the moment they collapse.
At the same time, it is also true that some institutional closures were preceded by accreditation action, including warning, probation, or loss of accreditation altogether. Accreditation has never functioned as an early warning system in the way financial regulators do, nor has it been designed to predict failure with precision. But the visibility of recent closures has intensified pressure on accreditors to clarify how financial sustainability, governance, and capacity factor into judgments of institutional quality. (Side note: I can’t stress enough how tools such as Gary Stocker and Matthew D. Hendricks viabillity and financial health apps & tools are game changes not only for students and parents but for faculty and higher ed leaders. Additionally, voices and expertise from folks like Rebeka Mazzone, CPA, CGMA and Daniel Greenstein are consistently part of my higher ed finance learning strategy).
From shield to design mechanism
Taken together, these developments point to a shift in function.
In 2026, accreditation is less likely to operate primarily as a defensive shield against political interference and more likely to act as a redesign mechanism for the field itself. Accreditors are being pushed, and in some cases choosing, to clarify what quality means in an increasingly crowded credential marketplace, to differentiate institutions more visibly, and to demonstrate that accreditation adds value beyond compliance alone.
For institutions, this changes the calculus.
Those who continue to treat accreditation as a periodic reporting exercise may find themselves reacting to changes they did not help shape. Those who understand accreditation as a strategic variable, tied to legitimacy, capacity, transparency, and long-term viability, will be better positioned to navigate what comes next.
What This Signals:
Accreditation is shifting from a background condition to an active force shaping institutional behavior, but it is doing so under heightened scrutiny.
In 2026, it will matter not just that institutions are accredited, but by whom, how, and for what purpose. Recent institutional closures have raised uncomfortable questions about what accreditation actually signals to the public, especially when financially fragile institutions remain accredited until the point of collapse. For critics, this has fueled skepticism about whether accreditation meaningfully assesses institutional viability or simply confirms procedural compliance.
That criticism is not entirely unfounded. Accreditation has never been designed to function as a predictive financial early warning system. Its role has historically centered on academic quality, governance, and mission alignment, not balance sheet forecasting. At the same time, a number of institutional closures were preceded by accreditation action, including warning, probation, or loss of accreditation. The challenge is not that accreditors do nothing, but that the public increasingly expects clearer signals about institutional sustainability.
This expectation is now shaping reform.
As accreditors streamline standards and reduce procedural complexity, pressure is building to sharpen accountability, particularly around financial capacity, governance effectiveness, and institutional resilience. How financial responsibility is defined, measured, and enforced remains unsettled. But it is unlikely to remain peripheral. Simplification is not just about reducing burden. It is also about making judgments clearer, more visible, and more meaningful to external audiences.
The deeper signal is this: accreditation is being pushed to say more with less. Fewer standards, fewer categories, and faster processes increase the stakes of what remains. Institutions should expect greater clarity about expectations, but also greater scrutiny of whether they can sustain the commitments they make to students.
In 2026 and beyond, accreditation is not just something institutions hold. It is increasingly something that communicates risk, credibility, and capacity to the public, whether accreditors are fully comfortable in that role or not.