Accreditation Choice and Innovation Act

The bill would rewrite Section 496 of the Higher Education Act, the law governing which accrediting agencies the Department of Education recognizes as reliable judges of college quality. States could designate their own accrediting entities (including industry-specific quality-assurance groups) for schools within the state, subject to a plan submitted to and reviewed by the Department. It would let the Department fast-track recognition of brand-new accrediting agencies within two years, require accreditors to adopt standardized student-success metrics such as earnings-to-cost comparisons, completion, and loan-repayment rates, and require risk-based compliance reviews that ease oversight of high-performing schools while tightening it on struggling ones. The bill would also add protections for religious institutions, including a formal complaint process if an accreditor's action is seen as disrespecting a school's religious mission, streamline how schools change accreditors, and reauthorize the National Advisory Committee on Institutional Quality and Integrity through September 30, 2028. It does not eliminate the existing accreditation requirement for federal aid eligibility or remove the Department's recognition role generally.

Colleges, universities, and other postsecondary programs that rely on accreditation to access federal student aid; existing and new accrediting agencies and associations; state governments that could designate their own accreditors; the Department of Education; religious institutions of higher education; and students whose enrollment, transfer, and financial aid eligibility depend on their school's accreditation status.

Accreditation status determines whether a school's students can receive federal financial aid, so changes to who can grant it and how schools are judged could reshape which institutions qualify, how quickly new accreditors can operate, and how heavily earnings and debt outcomes factor into a school's survival. Religious schools would gain a formal avenue to contest adverse accreditation actions.

States seeking to designate their own accreditors would submit plans to the Department, which must respond within 30 days, publish the plan and response in the Federal Register with a 30-day comment period, and allow states to revise plans based on comments. New accrediting agencies could apply for accelerated recognition, requiring monitoring reports back to the Department. The Department would convene an outside expert panel, exempt from federal advisory committee rules, to publish common accreditation terminology after a 60-day comment period. Accrediting agencies would build risk-scoring systems, require annual improvement plans from struggling schools, and publish accreditation histories online, while a new complaint process routes religious-mission disputes through the Secretary within set deadlines.