Agencies that establish operating standards for educational or professional institutions and programs, determine the extent to which the standards are met, and publicly announce their findings.

Voluntary, non-governmental, institutional accreditation is a unique characteristic of American education. In many other countries the maintenance of educational standards is a governmental function. No institution in the United States is required to seek accreditation, however, because of the recognized benefits most of the eligible institutions in the six accrediting regions of the United States have sought to become accredited. Institutional accreditation in higher education is a collegial process of self-review and peer review for improvement of academic quality and public accountability of institutions and programs. This quality review process occurs on a periodic basis, usually every three to 10 years. Typically, it involves three major activities:

• A self-evaluation by an institution or program using the standards or criteria of an accrediting organization.
• A peer review of an institution or program to gather evidence of quality.
• A decision or judgment by an accrediting organization to accredit, accredit with conditions, or not accredit an institution/program.

Regional accrediting bodies accredit institutions, not individual programs; however, programs are actively reviewed by the regional accrediting associations through the substantive change process. A second type of institutional accreditation is one that focuses on single mission institutions, such as theology (Association of Theological Schools – ATS), art and design (the National Association of Schools of Art and Design – NASAD), and music (the National Association of Schools of Music – NASM). Another type of accreditation is specialized or professional accreditation, which focuses on programs in a specific discipline, and not the institution. Examples are specialized accreditation in education, law, medicine, chiropractic, computer science, and more than 90 other disciplines.