^{Go directly to the original of the resource described below.}

[A]t the very core of the quality assurance process is the necessity for colleges and universities to clearly and unambiguously demonstrate student mastery of both discipline-specific and general education competencies in a fashion that is transparent to those both inside and outside of the academy.

• “The Future of Accreditation” by Judith S. Eaton
• “Accreditation and the Public Interest: Can Accreditors Continue to Play a Central Role in Public Policy?” by Terry W. Hartle
• “What’s an Accrediting Agency Supposed to Do? Institutional Quality and Improvement vs. Regulatory Compliance” by Elizabeth H. Sibolski
• “AQIP and Accreditation: Improving Quality and Performance” by Stephen D. Spangehl
• “Show Me the Learning: Value, Accreditation, and the Quality of the Degree” by Terrel L. Rhodes

SCUP members can visit their journal and download the entire issue, or selected articles as PDFs, MOBI (Kindle), and EPUB (iPad/iPhone and many Androids). About the contents, Middaugh writes:

The implications for planners of the issues raised in these five articles are both immediate and profound. How does higher education preserve and protect the integrity

of the peer evaluation process in quality assurance and,at the same time, responsibly address calls for greater transparency and accountability from the government and other entities? How do colleges and universities best work with their regional accrediting bodies to ensure the integrity of educational services provided under Title IV financial aid without having those accrediting bodies morph into the “accreditation police”? And at the very core of the quality assurance process is the necessity for colleges and universities to clearly and unambiguously demonstrate student mastery of both discipline-specific and general education competencies in a fashion that is transparent to those both inside and outside of the academy. The editorial staff of Planning for Higher Education is deeply grateful to the five authors who have so generously contributed to this issue of the journal. Their insights are quite provocative and provide substantial material for those of us whose planning activity is immersed in improving the quality of our institutions. (emphasis added)