Community College Accrediting Commission Shreds Documents, Attempts to Silence Dissent and Suppresses Evidence
CFT Lodges Complaint with US Department of Education
The California Federation of Teachers has amended its April 30 complaint to the Accrediting Commission for Community and Junior Colleges and filed it with the United States Department of Education. The original complaint is not only directed at the ACCJC’s assessment of City College of San Francisco, but also its inappropriate treatment of all California Community Colleges. In response to CFT’s 298 page complaint, plus 750 pages of documentation, the ACCJC sent a 7 page letter, which facilely denied all allegations of conflict of interest and violation of law and policy, and which failed to address the substance of the issues.
The amendment takes into account recent ACCJC actions, which include barring the public from its “public” meeting, passing a policy allowing the Commission to shred and destroy documents that are pertinent to the complaint, and attempting to prevent witnesses to Commission irregularities from providing evidence.
As CFT community college council president Jim Mahler notes, “These recent ACCJC actions to avoid transparency simply underscore the validity of CFT’s complaint. We are documenting the harm done to public higher education due to ACCJC’s harsh and inappropriate sanctions, and the Commission appears to be redoubling its efforts to ensure its actions and decisions never see the light of day.”