To meet accreditation standards, The New School must prove their programs have effective student outcomes as well as provide robust documentation on their financial resources by Aug 2025. 

The New School Provost’s office recently hosted an informational session regarding the university’s accreditation status with the Middle States Commission on Higher Education (MSCHE). It was led by Prisca Wood, the Assistant Provost of Compliance and Accreditation.

Multiple regulatory requirements need to be met by every institution under MSCHE. “There are some 250 laws that we have to abide by as an institution … but we have to demonstrate that we are compliant with all of them on a very routine basis,” Wood said. 

Every eight years, institutions must complete a self-study and peer review demonstrating that they are meeting MSCHE standards.

TNS received their first warning for failing to satisfy standards in 2013, according to Wood. Then, due to the part-time faculty strike, TNS was required to submit further documentation to fulfill the commission’s standards in 2022. The university seemed to be back on track in 2024 after submitting another self-study but was required to complete a peer evaluation to finish the process. 

The peer evaluation found that the university failed to comply with Standard V, which covers “Educational Effectiveness Assessment,” as well as Standard VI, which evaluates the institution’s “Planning, Resources, and Institutional Improvement.” 

“I want to really emphasize that this is not an adverse action. Middle States gave us this warning, and they call it a warning because they think that we have the ability to become compliant again by August,” Wood said. 

Wood stated that the warning in regards to Standard VI “is more of a matter of providing more exhaustive documentation,” emphasizing that the MSCHE Liaison suggested providing more data. 

This documentation includes financial projections and forecasting, as well as documentation demonstrating sufficient financial standing to support the university. 

Standard V requires the university to create program outcomes in a more “systematic” manner, outlining what students should be able to achieve at the end of their program. 

“What we’re doing is we have a working group, a leadership committee, that is working with constituents across the institution to make sure that we have implemented a systematic approach to assessment,” Wood said. “We are doing some key things in the short term to get us immediately in compliance with Middle States, and we are confident that they will [comply]… We are putting a lot of resources behind it.” 

Wood outlined several ways TNS will demonstrate their compliance. They are creating curricular maps, renaming and articulating program learning outcomes, as well as employing other recommendations from the MSCHE liaison. 

“No one here thinks that we are at any risk of anything like closure,” Wood said. “There would be a number of steps that would have to be taken that would escalate before [TNS] would get to that point. But there is no reason at this time to engage in any kind of planning for closure.”