The University of Oregon has received reaffirmation of its accreditation by the Northwest Commission on Colleges and Universities – the regional authority on educational quality and institutional effectiveness.

The NWCCU, which has accredited the UO since 1918, operates on seven-year accreditation cycles and the UO's current cycle began in 2011. The UO submitted its “Year Three Report” to the accrediting agency in March and received a letter reaffirming its accreditation earlier this month. The letter and additional information can be found on the UO’s accreditation website.

“This reaffirmation is an important step,” commented Dave Hubin, Senior Assistant to the President and the University’s Accreditation Liaison Officer. “Within our regional accreditation agency, individual institutions are given the opportunity to define success around core themes reflected in their individual missions.  Our core themes and our metrics are all related to our position as a public university within the Association of American Universities. Our criteria for mission achievement will be benchmarked on data from the AAU Data Exchange. In our next study, which we submit in anticipation of the Commission’s full-scale visit in 2016, we will present comprehensive information and analysis addressing our performance in comparison to our public AAU peers.”

Accreditation by a regional accrediting agency – which includes a peer review process – qualifies institutions and their students for access to federal funds that support teaching, research and student financial aid. Accreditation is intended to provide reasonable assurance about the quality of opportunities available to students who attend the institution.

The NWCCU is an independent, non-profit membership organization recognized by the U.S. Department of Education and the Council for Higher Education Accreditation (CHEA) as the regional authority on educational quality and institutional effectiveness for seven Northwest states.