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History and
Mission The UCRED, the
International University Council Accrediting
Inter-collegiate and Special Programmes Worldwide, was established in
1972 as the Inter-collegiate Advisory Council for International
Programmes (IACIP). The UCRED acronym was adopted in 1992. In the past thirty-five
years senior representatives and faculty members from more than eighty
leading institutions of higher education, located around the world, joined the
Council. In view of the
educational paradigm shifts that
typified the 1970s and 1980s, then followed by the surge of higher education
offered via the internet (in the 1990s and 2000s), the UCRED functioned as a special commission for the validation of academic and degree
programmes that were
not within the immediate scope of competence of local governmental or
other official accreditation bodies. Changes in 2005-2006 ("Ensign") In the past the IACIP-UCRED coordination units were hosted on a
rotating basis by the Council-members' organisations, their
faculties, or associated entities. In 2005 the Brexgata University
Academy, the independent trans-national academic assembly, became the
permanent host for UCRED. The ENSIGN Project, a fourteen months' process
that consisted of integrating the Council into the University Academy,
was completed in December 2006. Since then the enlarged
organisation's activities involve
institutions of higher education; public, supranational, and
non-governmental organisations; as well as corporations and
other educational associations around the world. Accredited Programmes (1972-2006) Between 1972
and 2006 the UCRED accredited sixty-eight programmes (curricula).
Thirty-five programmes were subsequently
recognised by a governmental agency or other official
accreditation body. Thirty-three degree programmes continue to be monitored by UCRED,
of which seventeen programme-contracts are managed on behalf of a governmental body or supranational
constituency. In May 2006 the Council
decided it would not follow the trend of market-driven accreditation
services offered by a number of other organisations around the world. As a result
thereof the Council's role and activity of assessing and validating
institutional requests for accreditation of newly
established programmes has been gradually phased out.
In order to avoid any possible conflicts of interest for, or between
educational institutions or other parties, the phasing out process was
harmonised with the ENSIGN integration project, and fully completed in December
2006.
Continued
Services (2007- 2012) Since January
2007, and until at least January 2012, the Council continues to ensure the full-scale and
independent monitoring of all programmes that were under its custody or aegis prior to
the ENSIGN integration (e.g. for the accredited programmes that were already
monitored by the UCRED prior to 31 December 2006). This
uninterrupted service is provided in accordance with the high quality
standards and norms the UCRED has maintained during the past three
decades. These norms have been adopted as best practices by many
educational institutions and other accrediting bodies around the world.
Verification of Accreditation In order to
prevent possible fraudulent use of information made available on the
internet, the Council no longer publishes
an open-access list of accredited programmes (see also: Public
Notice). Persons who wish to verify by means of the internet the current accreditation of a programme
are invited to contact the educational institution that offers the
programme, which will provide the access-coordinates of the official accreditation data
on the
extranet of the Council's website (e.g. with the same URL-track of this
website). For further
information or clarifications please contact the Council at the
University Academy.
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