Tim Leeds Havre Daily News tleeds@havredailynews.com
A team of postsecondary education professionals were at Montana State University-Northern last week conducting a 10-year review of the university’s ability to provide higher education. “It’s a positive process I believe in very strongly,” Northern Chancellor Alex Capdeville said. The team represent ing the Northwest Commission on Colleges and Universities spent three days split into groups reviewing different aspects of the university, from academic programs to fiscal resources. The accreditation commission oversees the process in six other states as well as Montana: Alaska, Idaho, Nevada, Oregon, Utah, and Washington. It oversees accreditation for 160 institutions in the region. Part of the process is the university conducting a self-analysis and preparing a report of its findings before the accreditation team comes in. The team then reviews that report before doing its evaluation. The process is ongoing, Capdeville said. Northern was last visited by a full accreditation team in 1997, with a partial team coming in for review in 2002. That five-year review between the 10-year full team visiting the campus is typical, he said. The team will now prepare its report of findings to submit to the commission, Capdeville said. He will appear before the commission at its January meeting in Bellevue, Wash., to discuss the findings of the evaluation team. He said typically the evaluation team will find areas of each institution evaluated where things can be improved. “The whole purpose of Northwest accreditation is to improve the institution,” he said.
