Major Higher Ed. Community Developments on State Authorization

The higher education community continues to make significant progress toward addressing the problems of distance education state authorization through the development of a state authorization reciprocity proposal. The Commission on the Regulation of Postsecondary Distance Education, a joint effort of the Association of Public and Land-Grant Universities (APLU) and the State Higher Education Executive Officers (SHEEO), recently released its final report, Advancing Access through Regulatory Reform: Findings, Principles, and Recommendations for the State Authorization Reciprocity Agreement (SARA). The report essentially continues the evolution of the SARA concept that began with the work of the Presidents' Forum / Council of State Governments (CSG) project, which developed a conceptual model for reciprocity, and the Western Interstate Commission for Higher Education (WICHE) SARA effort, which refined the conceptual model into an implementation framework that uses the four regional higher education compacts--WICHE, the Southern Regional Education Board (SREB), the Midwestern Higher Education Compact (MHEC), and the New England Board of Higher Education (NEBHE)--as the vehicles for establishing and sustaining SARA across the country.

The report's key recommendations include further clarifying the nature of the "physical presence" an institution would have to have in a state to trigger its authorization process, as opposed to having the institution's authorization by its home state accepted by the given state via reciprocity. The Commission proposes that states participating in SARA adopt a physical presence definition for the purposes of reciprocity that limits it to "the ongoing occupation of an actual physical location for instructional purposes or the maintenance of an administrative office to facilitate instruction in the state." The Commission further strengthens this definition by specifically noting a range of activities that would NOT constitute physical presence, including advertising, recruiting, proctored examinations, and "experiential learning opportunities, such as a clinical, practicum, residency, or internship" assuming that the institution has already secured any necessary professional and/or licensing board approvals and only ten or fewer students are simultaneously present at a given field site.

The report also highlights the Commission's view of the shape a national SARA coordinating board should take. The earlier WICHE SARA implementation framework had envisioned such a board as a forum in which the regional higher education compacts, each implementing SARA within their regions, would work together with other state and higher education representatives to harmonize SARA operation across the country. The Commission proposes that the board be formed in such a fashion to ensure that the regional compacts have a strong but not dominating voice in its deliberations, with the goal of establishing an effective balance among the views and interests of all stakeholders, including those of the colleges and universities that will have to operate under the SARA structure.

Shortly after the release of the report earlier this month, the Presidents' Forum and Council of State Governments convened a national meeting on SARA implementation involving higher education and state government representatives from 47 states (only Delaware, Hawaii, and New York did not send teams). Russ Poulin, Deputy Director for Research and Analysis, WICHE Cooperative for Educational Technologies (WCET)--or as I call him, "Mr. SARA"--served as both a presenter and participant in the meeting, which allowed him to provide an excellent overview of the event. In particular, he highlights the broad expressions of support for the SARA effort coming from national higher education leaders and regulators, as well as the continuing need to build greater trust between the state regulatory and higher education accreditation communities to advance SARA implementation. He also notes the regional compacts' pursuit of foundation funding to support the launch of the SARA implementation framework.

Finally, Russ stresses the importance of respecting the roles, responsibilities, and perspectives of state regulators as partners in this process, with a close that bears repeating:

While there are regulations that are real head-scratchers, there is real purpose behind many of these regulations. We should not paint everyone charged with overseeing authorization in the states with the same brush. They are charged with upholding their laws. They are charged with protecting students.

Reciprocity is asking them to make significant changes in their work, to go out on a limb and trust others, and to accept the risk of those changes. Since they will face much of the impact, the least the rest of us can do is respect them and listen to them.