A Comparison of Selected Categories of Accreditation ... · TEC-ABET and AACSB By Dr. C. Douglas Ward and Dr. John Dugger Volume 18, Number 3 - May 2002 to July 2002 Reviewed Article

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Journal of Industrial Technology • Volume 18, Number 3 • May 2002 to July 2002 • www.nait.org

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The Official Electronic Publication of the National Association of Industrial Technology • www.nait.org© 2002

A Comparison of Selected Categoriesof Accreditation Standards of NAIT,

TEC-ABET and AACSB

By Dr. C. Douglas Ward and Dr. John Dugger

Volume 18, Number 3 - May 2002 to July 2002

Reviewed Article

AdministrationCurriculum

Higher EducationNAIT

Research

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A Comparison of SelectedCategories of AccreditationStandards of the NationalAssociation of IndustrialTechnology, the Technol-ogy Accreditation Commis-sion of the AccreditationBoard for Engineering andTechnology and the Ameri-can Association of Colle-giate Schools of BusinessBy Dr. C. Douglas Ward and Dr. John Dugger

Dr. John C. Dugger is Dean of the College of Tech-nology and Professor of Interdisciplinary Technol-ogy at Eastern Michigan University. From 1989 to1997 he served as the department chair of Indus-trial Education and Technology at Iowa State Uni-versity. Dr. Dugger has secured more than $950,000in grants and has authored more than 40 publica-tions in juried journals. His scholarly interests in-clude assessing the impacts of training interven-tions in manufacturing organizations. He has morethan 20 years of experience as a faculty memberand administrator in higher education.

Dr. C. Douglas Ward is Owner/President of Knowl-edge Based Change, LLC in Ames, Iowa. Dr. Wardteaches Continuous Quality Improvement conceptsto organizations as well as facilitating the applica-tion of quality improvement principles within pro-cess improvement teams. He has served in numer-ous leadership and management positions in gov-ernment and was among the first group of seniormilitary personnel to be educated in the Demingphilosophy. Prior to establishing his own company,Dr. Ward was the Business Development Leader andAssociate for the Center for Continuous QualityImprovement. He is a retired Commissioned Of-ficer from the United States Navy with a great dealof experience in training, education and operations.He served as Commanding Officer of a major train-ing facility, a nuclear submarine and as Professorof Naval Science at Iowa State University.

Industrial technologists frequentlywork with graduates of engineering andbusiness programs suggesting that theremay be some workplace derived benefitfrom establishing programs based onconsistent standards. What makes aprogram? What are the essentialelements of business, engineering, andindustrial technology programs? Theauthors attempt to answer these andother questions by exploring how theaccreditation systems define and specifythe content and experiences thatconstitute a program.

The National Association ofIndustrial Technology (NAIT) hasassumed a key role in defining theessential elements of Industrial Tech-nology. The Association, for example,has accredited 93 baccalaureate and 30associate level programs. The purposeof the NAIT accreditation process, asdefined in the Industrial Technology

Accreditation Handbook (NAITHandbook), is “providing recognitionof the attainment of certain profes-sional goals and standards for Indus-trial Technology”(p.1).

The NAIT Handbook has definedIndustrial Technology as a “field ofstudy designed to prepare technicaland/or technical management orientedprofessionals for employment inbusiness, industry, education, andgovernment”(NAIT Handbook, p.1).The accreditation standards establishedby NAIT are particularly useful inproviding a basis for discipline devel-opment because they are well publi-cized and frequently utilized in pro-gram curriculum development toensure initial and periodic accredita-tion. Accreditation standards must beclear, explicit, and consistent to beeffective. The NAIT definition ofIndustrial Technology certainly

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suggests needed competence intechnical as well as business/manage-ment fields.

Based on more than 25 years ofhigher education experience, whichinvolved constant interaction withcompanies that hire industrial technol-ogy graduates, there continues to bemuch confusion about the intent ofindustrial technology, engineeringtechnology and certain businesscurricula such as production andoperations management among humanresource professionals and otherinterested parties. A study of the keycomponents of engineering technologyand business accreditation standardsand a comparison of those with theNAIT baccalaureate accreditationstandards would be helpful in promot-ing a better understanding of thedifferences and similarities betweenindustrial technology, engineeringtechnology and business. This in-creased knowledge should result inmore consistent terminology and abetter basis for academic collaborationand collaboration among graduates ofthe respective programs. The purposeof this paper is to analyze and comparethe National Association of IndustrialTechnology (NAIT) accreditationstandards, the American Association ofCollegiate Schools of Business(AACSB) accreditation standards andthe Technology Accreditation Commis-sion of the Accreditation Board forEngineering and Technology (TAC ofABET) standards. This analysisrequired the creation of a structure thatwas used to group similar standards foreach accrediting body. The standardsfor each accrediting body were com-pared within the structure to helpidentify similarities and differences thatwill result in a better understanding ofprograms within each of the threeacademic areas.

Logical groupings of standardsappear to be curriculum, instruction,and faculty. The “curriculum” headingattempts to group standards thataddress the identification of contentand the structure of this content.“Instruction” on the other hand groupsthose standards that specify howcontent is delivered. While “faculty”

contains standards that specifyrequired and desired backgrounds andformal education for each field. Thiscomparative analysis provides afocused approach for identifyingdifferences between disciplines andtherefore, may be useful in revealingopportunities for change as part of thestrategic planning process.

Accreditation and its influenceon the academic discipline

An objective of accreditation, nomatter what the academic discipline, isto ensure that certain predeterminedsets of standards that have beenestablished by the particular professionare being followed. Program approvalby the accrediting body recognizes thiscompliance. For example, all threeaccrediting bodies address the need toestablish program benchmarks such asstudent admission requirements,retention, scholastic success andgraduate placement data. While notdirectly affecting the discipline devel-opment, the collection and analysis ofthese data, where appropriate, plays akey role in ensuring that the needs ofindustry as well as students and societyare being met. NAIT, AACSB, andTAC of ABET set the standards forprogram accreditation in IndustrialTechnology, Business Administration,and Engineering Technology respec-tively. Each of the accrediting organi-zations has identified standardsappropriate for their respective aca-demic bodies. The basic approaches toestablishing, monitoring and modifyingthese standards is very similar. In fact,an ABET representative sits on theNAIT Board of Accreditation and aNAIT representative sits on the ABETboard of Accreditation suggesting acooperative approach to accreditationin the technology related disciplines.

Industrial Technology coverscontent that is specific only to indus-trial technology, but may includeelements of engineering technologyand/or business. The NAIT, theAACSB and the TAC of ABET definetheir disciplines based on scholarlyactivities reported at conferences andthrough publications reflected inestablished accreditation standards.

This comparison of the accreditationstandards published by NAIT, AACSB,and TAC of ABET was conducted inpart to stimulate interest in change, ifappropriate, that would improve theaccreditation process as well as eachdiscipline.

Program componentsEach of the standards establishes

the direction of the accreditationprocess with guidelines focused on themajor categories of curriculum,instruction, faculty, student body,administration, and industrial advisorycommittees. Where differences occuras the result of the inclusion of severalminor categories the differences can beappropriately assessed by includingthem in one of the broader categories.This paper focuses on the majorcategories of curriculum, instruction,and faculty since these areas provide ameans to define the discipline contentthat directly supports the students.

CurriculumThe curriculum focus of each of

the accreditation programs is similaralthough different enough for each tobenefit from a comparative analysis. Inmany respects Industrial Technology isvery closely aligned with the Engineer-ing Technology component of ABETand the accreditation standards estab-lished by NAIT and TAC of ABET arelikewise quite similar. Based on thespecificity of requirements and pro-gram content, TAC of ABET andAACSB seem to be the most prescrip-tive with respect to major programs andcurricula. Table 1 provides a compari-son of the accreditation agencies withrespect to the curriculum requirementsof each standard.

InstructionThe instructional component of

each of the accrediting bodies has adifferent focus. The NAIT, as dis-cussed in Section 6.4 of the IndustrialTechnology Accreditation Handbook,is more student oriented in this compo-nent with clear guidance that is di-rected toward helping the studentcomplete the course of study. TheAACSB is generally more prescriptive

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with regard to faculty and institutionrequirements. There is very littlestudent specific guidance provided byTAC of ABET in this area, TAC ofABET is however, very focused on thefaculty and the institution.

FacultyTAC of ABET states that the

faculty is the heart of any educationalprogram and provides numerousspecific qualification requirements.TAC of ABET is also very specificwith regard to academic preparation offaculty for Engineering Technologyand the requirements are very nearlythe same as those specified for NAITand AACSB with respect to degreerequirements.

AACSB is the only accreditingagency that addresses, in their respec-tive accreditation standard, the need toensure diversity as well as requiringdemonstrated support for a facultyintellectual development program.Both TAC of ABET and AACSB do,however, require a specific number offull time faculty based on individual

program, but NAIT simply states thatthere needs to be an adequate numberof appropriately qualified facultywithout reference to program. Impor-tant also is the need to address effectiveadvising, emphasized by all threeagencies, to ensure that students arewell prepared to be successful.

Administration (philosophy/objectives)

All three accrediting organizationseffectively address the administrativeaspects of accreditation. Table 4 summa-rizes the major components of each.

NAIT, unlike TAC of ABET andAACSB, puts a great deal of emphasison institutional compliance. TAC ofABET and AACSB are both veryspecific in requiring that everythingfrom the mission statement to thedevelopment of educational objectivesmust be clearly established by thecollege of engineering or the school ofbusiness, while NAIT focuses more onthe compatibility and understanding ofthe mission statement and objectives.

NAIT and TAC of ABET addressthe need for effective administrativeleadership while AACSB is relativelysilent on the issue. NAIT is clear instating the need to identify a leader andABET in its Engineering Technologystandard goes one step further byrequiring the leader be a full timefaculty member. TAC of ABET is muchmore aggressive than either NAIT orAACSB at establishing standards forgood communications and its relation-ship to program effectiveness.

Support (facilities/equipment,financial resources)TAC of ABET is very clear in estab-lishing specific responsibility forfacility and financial support forEngineering Technology while theAACSB and NAIT accreditationstandards are less clear concerning theinstitutional requirements with regardto facilities to house and operate theIndustrial Technology and businessprograms. All three are clear aboutparticular needs but only TAC ofABET suggests who is responsible for

Table 1: Major program curriculum (Excerpted from NAIT, AACSB, and TAC of ABET Accreditation Guidelines)

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Table 2: Major program instruction (Excerpted from NAIT, AACSB, and TAC of ABET Accreditation Guidelines)

providing this. While documentingfacility provisions is not an establishedneed of the discipline, it tends to lendcreditability when being considered ona par basis between the three disci-plines. Certainly facilities need toreflect the requirements of the offerededucational programs as well asensuring that well maintained andmodernized equipment is available forprogram graduates to become ad-equately versed in industry standards,and each accreditation standardeffectively addresses this issue.

NAIT and TAC of ABET are by farthe most aggressive in assessing thestudent support aspects of accreditationwith a great deal of emphasis onstudent needs such as advising, place-ment, retention, and scholastic success.AACSB places little emphasis on theseissues but they are addressed. Finan-cial support is considered in the TAC ofABET and NAIT standards with TACof ABET being much more specific inthe details of required fiscal policy.

Emerging ET2K standardsAs has been previously discussed,

the accreditation standards for Indus-trial Technology, Engineering Technol-ogy and Business have focused almostexclusively on program and institu-tional requirements. Each providedetailed guidelines that leave littlequestion about what is required with

respect to curriculum, instruction, orfaculty. A detailed comparison ofspecific areas for each discipline isprovided in Table 1, Table 2 and Table3. While all requirements are notrepeated in the tables it should beevident from the discipline comparisonthat the emphasis is currently on theinputs with little attention given tooutcomes. This lack of attention tohow program graduates or for thatmatter, students, perform begs a veryimportant question, should the “what todo” paradigm change to one of “whathas been or is being accomplished”?This represents a shift from a prescrip-tive approach, which delineates credithour requirements to one that focuseson the ability of the graduate tofunction effectively in a team environ-ment. This revised direction clearlyemphasizes outcomes and is directedtoward continuous improvement.

TAC of ABET in their proposedEngineering Technology Criteria 2000(ET2K) may be leading the way towardsa more outcomes based accreditationprocess that focuses almost entirely ondemonstrated ability on the part ofstudents, graduates, faculty and theinstitution seeking accreditation for itsprograms. TAC of ABET, in theproposed new standard, has eliminatednearly all of the current specific require-ments. A requirement for the minimumnumber of semester hours (124) or

quarter hours (186) for baccalaureateprograms as well as similar appropriateassociate degree program requirementsis an example of one of the very fewremaining specific requirements. Thisshift in criteria moves from a highlystructured format that is based ongeneral and program criteria to a formatthat establishes five criteria that clearlyaddress program expectations.

This dramatic shift in philosophymakes it possible for the developmentof more innovative programs thatcould, in the opinion of the authors,contribute to program improvementsthat may bring extremely positivebenefits to the participating disciplines.

AssessmentA key component to the success of

any discipline is the demonstratedsatisfaction of its customers. Thiscomparison of the AACSB, TAC ofABET, and NAIT suggests thatexpanding the accrediting body focuson employer satisfaction with gradu-ates, graduate satisfaction with employ-ment, career mobility, starting salary,and the ability of graduates to functioneffectively in industry without addi-tional training would be appropriate inimproving the method for assessing theeffectiveness of each program. This isparticularly important for the NAITbecause of the relative infancy ofindustrial technology as a discipline

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Table 3: Major program faculty (Excerpted from NAIT, AACSB, and TAC of ABET Accreditation Guidelines)

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compared to engineering or business.By emphasizing concern about theseareas through some form of evaluation,the NAIT would make known what isexpected from the institution, thegraduate, and the program to make thediscipline attractive not only to theusers of the product (graduates), butalso to future students.

The NAIT specifically requires, aspart of the accreditation process,assessment data from employers andinstitutions (student achievementacross the curricula and academicprofiles) to establish a need for follow-up studies that are to be made availableto prospective students. TAC of ABETsimply requires data that can be used asa record of how successful graduatesare in their profession or furtheracademic study. The AACSB requiresthat each degree program be systemati-cally monitored for revision andimprovement, but provides no guidancewith respect to the source of data, forexample employers or institutions.

There needs to be criteria estab-lished to provide consistent directionon how the assessment data should beused and as a minimum should includeprocedures on how to use the data for

program improvement and faculty/student development. These guidelinesare particularly important to insurecontinued program improvement basedon outcome assessment.

ConclusionsEach of the three accrediting

agencies clearly has their own strengthsand weaknesses. Engineering andBusiness however, have a more definedhistory and may have gained recognitionbased on their longevity as academicprograms. Industrial Technology hasnot been well understood as a disciplineand it is therefore extremely importantfor the NAIT to be proactive in takingadvantage of the proven aspects of TACof ABET and AACSB accreditationstandards to help define the methodol-ogy for program evaluation and im-provement. The following are specificareas that would strengthen the NAIT’scontribution to defining IndustrialTechnology as a discipline.

The NAIT standards seem to bevery general when compared to TAC ofABET in addressing the conceptualneed to maintain technical currency.This area is particularly important inorder to stimulate innovation in the

instructional process as well as im-proved coordination between laboratorysessions and theoretical aspects pre-sented in the classroom. This concept isconsistent with the increasing emphasison research at all universities. A clearstandard needs to be included in theNAIT accreditation guidelines thatassures support for continued facultydevelopment within both associate andbaccalaureate programs. The AACSBstandards accomplish this by consider-ing basic scholarship, applied scholar-ship, and industrial development asspecific areas for required facultyactivity, an approach that could easily beadapted by the NAIT.

While it is important that the NAITbe conscious of host institutions, itsstandards should reflect the precepts ofa professional discipline that stands onits own with clearly focused objectivesthat reflect the needs of industry andacademia through the student. Thereshould be clear guidance with regard tothe relative emphasis on teaching,intellectual contributions, and servicethat is supplemented by universitysupport, thus making the program self-directed and focused. It is also veryimportant that established standards

Table 4: Philosophy and objectives (Excerpted from NAIT, AACSB, and TAC of ABET Accreditation Guidelines)

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consider effective communicationsbetween faculty and administration withan emphasis on including faculty andstudents in the decision making process.Specifically requiring the individualresponsible for the program to be a fulltime faculty member is certainlyappropriate and helps with the commu-nication and coordination effort.

The NAIT leadership must addressthe adequacy of financial resources toensure the acquisition, retention, andcontinued professional development ofthe faculty. Without the support of theinstitution in this critical area there canbe no expectation that desirablecandidates would be attracted to openpositions and thus little or no hope formaintaining a credible discipline.

The NAIT has done a commend-able job of establishing an effectiveaccreditation standard and the NAITaccreditation guidelines do a very goodjob of establishing specific courseworkguidance at the baccalaureate level.The TAC of ABET and AACSBstandards are prescriptive in defininginstitutional and external support, whileNAIT is focused more on consistencywithin the university. Comparison ofthe accreditation standards suggeststhat NAIT, like TAC of ABET has beenin its ET2k approach, must be proac-tive in upgrading its accreditationstandards to include language that isclear in its specificity with less depen-dence on established requirements thatare “consistent” with the institution.

ReferencesCriteria for Accrediting Engineering

Technology Programs. (2000-2001cycle)

Engineering Accreditation Commis-sion, Accreditation Board forEngineering and Technology, INC

Industrial Technology AccreditationHandbook. (2000) National Asso-ciation of Industrial Technology.

Standards for Accreditation of BusinessAdministration and Accounting.(2000) American Assembly ofCollegiate Schools of Business.

Documents

A Comparison of Selected Categories of Accreditation ... · TEC-ABET and AACSB By Dr. C. Douglas Ward and Dr. John Dugger Volume 18, Number 3 - May 2002 to July 2002 Reviewed Article