In the ongoing drama of external credentialing, initials and acronyms are confusingly abundant. Here is a brief list of the principal players and their alphabetic equivalents.
COPA, the Council on Postsecondary Accreditation, is a nongovernmental organization that officially recognizes regional and national accrediting bodies. In January it changed its name to CORPA, the Committee on Recognition of Postsecondary Accreditation. According to its Annual Directory, the organization “recognizes, coordinates, and…. reviews the work of its member accrediting bodies, and the appropriateness of existing or proposed accrediting bodies and their activities…” It is supported by dues and assessments paid by member bodies.
Accreditation by a CORPA-recognized body is a consideration in many formal actions taken by government funding agencies, state licensing boards, and scholarship commissions. Currently CORPA recognizes over fifty national and regional accrediting bodies, among them the AMAs Committee on Allied Health Education and Accreditation, the American Psychological Association internship programs, and the National Association of State Universities. Recognition requires an application process lasting at least a year, demonstrate compliance with fifty-six separate provisions, and usually a site visit.
COPA/CORPA has long had a policy of recognizing only one accrediting body in a field. Its guidelines state that “duplication of accrediting in the same general area is to be avoided since it invites inconsistent and contradictory standards and accrediting actions and thus leads to confusion on the part of students, institutions, and the public.” Recently, however, The Americans attorney has learned, in a telephone conversation with CORPA's acting director, that since the January reorganization that policy has changed. Now, in order not to discourage competition, several accrediting bodies may be recognized in a field. This change in policy does not yet appear in published guidelines.
Not a female deer, this agency, the U.S. Department of Education, recognizes accrediting bodies independently of CORPA. It too has
indicated a willingness to recognize more than one body in a field. The application process, like CORPA's, takes a year or more and involves site visits.
A tangible advantage in being recognized by “dee-oh-ee” is that government grants and low-cost loans are made available to students in DOE-accredited training centers. The American has been unsuccessful in its applications, because it fails to meet the DOE requirement that an accrediting organization operate independently of any trade or membership organization.
NAAP, the National Association for the Advancement of Psychoanalysis, was formed some twenty years ago. In 1990 it claimed fifteen member institutes, and since then it claims to have added five more. However, since many NAAP institutes are short-lived, folding after a few years, this figure may be as exaggerated as the group's claim to be a national organization. In fact, NAAP institutes exist in only five states: seven in the New York area, two in New Jersey, two in Philadelphia, one in Colorado, and three in California. Three are listed as Jungian, one as Adlerian, one as Existentialist, and the remainder as Freudian, Modern Freudian, or Object Relations.
Finally, ABAP, the American Board for Accreditation in Psychoanalysis, is the nominally independent organization set up by NAAP to apply for COPA recognition.