Regionally Accredited Institutions Provide Higher Quality Education

When choosing a degree program, whether it is online or traditional make sure that the school is regionally accredited. Do not attend schools that are only nationally accredited. If you do, you will be setting yourself up to spend more money than you should to get you degree. A college degree is an investment that you make in your future. Don't just go to any school.

For example, I attended Florida Metropolitan University, Fort Lauderdale for my bachelors. Back in 1991, the school was called Fort Lauderdale College. The admissions rep at the time said that they were in the process of becoming a university as well as regionally accredited. One of the two became a reality. In 1994, the school became Florida Metropolitan University, Fort Lauderdale. It became one of the largest private universities in the State of Florida.

When it came for me to decide to get my MBA, I applied to Hawaii Pacific University. In 1997, the school was regionally accredited and did not require the GMAT as part of the admissions process. They said it was "not required, but highly recommended." I got accepted into their MBA program, but because my bachelors was from a nationally accredited school and not regionally accredited, I had to take a lot of undergraduate courses as a prequisite. This prolonged my graduate studies and jacked up the amount of student loans that I had to take out.

In 2006, when I decided to go back to graduate school for a second Masters as part of a career change to Psychology, I applied to Nova Southeastern University. They too are a regionally accredited institution that may require the GMAT upon descretion from the admissions committee. I called up Florida Metropolitan University to speak with the registrar to request official transcripts be sent to the school. Since I was paying by credit card, I ordered two copies of my transcripts. When I received my copy of the transcripts, it look like it was printed off of a cheap laser printer. The paper that it was printed on was ordinary printer paper. There was no school logo at the top, nor was there an official seal at the bottom. This is pretty standard stuff when it comes to official transcripts. The end result was that I was asked to take the GMAT. Now, Florida Metropolitan University is no more as they changed their name to Everest University.

So I settled on Liberty University. This school is both regionally accredited and nationally accredited, and has division I athletics. The tuition is affordable too at only $395 per credit hour. The staff and instructors are of the same quality that I experienced at Hawaii Pacific University.

Why go to a regionally accredited college or university? Regionally accredited colleges recognize degrees and credits earned at other regionally accredited institutions as equal to their own. Regionally accredited institutions typically do not recognize credits from many nationally accredited institutions. Regionally accredited institutions have a higher standard academic excellence than those that are nationally accredited because they are able to recruit more qualified teachers.

To find out if a college or university is regionally accredited, you may first visit the college website that you are interested in to find out who the accrediting agencies are. Than you can go to that particular agency responsible for the accreditation in that state to verify the accreditation.