To check if a university is accredited, search two free federal-facing databases: the U.S. Department of Education’s Database of Accredited Postsecondary Institutions and Programs (DAPIP) at ope.ed.gov/dapip, and the Council for Higher Education Accreditation directory at chea.org. If the school appears in either with an active status from a recognized accrediting agency, its accreditation is legitimate. If it doesn’t appear, or the accreditor isn’t on the recognized list, the degree may not qualify for federal financial aid, credit transfer, or professional licensing.
Why This Check Is Worth Doing
Under federal law, a school must be accredited by an agency the Secretary of Education recognizes before it counts as an “institution of higher education” eligible for federal funding.1Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 20 USC 1001 – General Definition of Institution of Higher Education Pell Grants, federal student loans, and work-study are unavailable at unaccredited schools. Military tuition assistance carries the same requirement: the institution must hold accreditation from a Department-recognized agency.2The Official Army Benefits Website. Tuition Assistance (TA)
Accreditation also drives whether your credits transfer, whether employers accept your degree, and whether state licensing boards let you sit for professional exams. About a third of institutions already restrict enrollment in at least one licensure-track program because of uncertainty over whether graduates will meet state requirements, with nursing, teacher education, and mental health programs hit hardest.3WCET. Certifying Compliance in an Uncertain Landscape – Survey Findings on the Impact of Professional Licensure Requirements A degree from an unaccredited school compounds every one of those problems.
Step 1: Search the Department of Education Database
Start at DAPIP (ope.ed.gov/dapip). The database pulls information directly from recognized accrediting agencies and state approval agencies, so it’s the most authoritative single source.4Office of Postsecondary Education (OPE). DAPIP Database of Accredited Postsecondary Institutions and Programs Type the school’s full legal name into the search field. If nothing comes up, drop generic words like “University” or “College” and try searching by location. Some schools file under a parent institution or a legal name that differs from the name on their marketing pages.
Click through to the institution’s detail page and look at three fields.
Status. “Accredited” is what you want to see. “Probation” means the school’s quality has fallen below standards and its accreditation is at risk. “Pre-accredited” means the school is working toward full accreditation but hasn’t reached it. Both carry real uncertainty.5U.S. Department of Education. Accreditation Handbook – Department of Education
Accrediting agency. Write down the name. You’ll verify it separately in Step 3.
Next review date. If that date has already passed without an updated record, treat it as a signal worth investigating.5U.S. Department of Education. Accreditation Handbook – Department of Education
Also check whether the listing is for the main campus or a branch. Branch campuses usually fall under the main campus’s accreditation, and the detail page will confirm this. For an online program or satellite location, make sure it’s covered under the institution’s accreditation rather than operating on its own.
Step 2: Cross-Check the CHEA Directory
The CHEA database at chea.org covers more than 8,000 postsecondary institutions and over 25,000 programs accredited by agencies recognized by CHEA, the Department of Education, or both.6Council for Higher Education Accreditation. Search Institutions A second search here catches anything DAPIP might miss and gives you a different vantage on the same question.
Search by institution name and match the result to the specific campus location you’re considering. Different campuses within the same university system can carry different accreditation statuses. The results identify the accrediting agency and the accreditation period, and you can follow links to the agency’s own site to confirm the school is listed as a member in good standing.7Council for Higher Education Accreditation. CHEA – Find Accredited Higher Education Institutions and Programs
If the school appears in DAPIP but not in CHEA, or vice versa, that doesn’t automatically mean something is wrong. Some accreditors are recognized by the Department of Education but not by CHEA, and a few are recognized by CHEA but not the Department. For federal financial aid eligibility, Department of Education recognition is what counts. CHEA recognition is a separate, voluntary quality endorsement.
Step 3: Verify the Accrediting Agency Itself
This is the step most people skip, and it’s the one that catches fraud. The word “accreditation” is not legally protected. Anyone can create an organization, give it an official-sounding name, and start accrediting schools. These outfits are called accreditation mills, and they exist to give cover to degree mills.
The Department of Education maintains a list of all recognized accrediting agencies at ope.ed.gov/accreditation, currently listing 62 active agencies across institutional and programmatic categories.8Office of Postsecondary Education (OPE). View Agencies – U.S. Department of Education CHEA publishes its own list of recognized accreditors.9Council for Higher Education Accreditation. CHEA-Recognized Accrediting Organizations If the agency named on the school’s page isn’t on either list, the accreditation is meaningless for federal purposes.
Warning signs that an accreditor is a mill:
- The agency isn’t on either recognized list. This is the single most reliable indicator. No amount of professional-sounding language on a website overrides absence from the Department of Education or CHEA lists.
- It accredits very few schools. A legitimate accreditor reviews dozens or hundreds of institutions. An agency that accredits only one school, or only schools tied to the same owner, is almost certainly fake.
- It claims recognition by UNESCO or a foreign government. UNESCO does not accredit or recognize educational institutions. Any school or accreditor invoking a UNESCO tie is waving a red flag.
- Its review process isn’t documented. Legitimate accreditors publish standards, evaluation procedures, and review schedules. If you can’t find how the agency actually evaluates schools, walk away.
Federal recognition for an accrediting agency lasts a maximum of five years before the agency must be reviewed again.10CHEA – Council for Higher Education Accreditation. Recognition of Accrediting Organizations That ongoing oversight is what separates real accreditors from paper ones.
Check Programmatic Accreditation for Licensed Careers
Institutional accreditation covers the school as a whole. Programmatic accreditation covers a specific degree program within the school, and for certain careers, it’s the one that actually matters. You can attend an accredited university and still end up with a degree that doesn’t qualify you for a professional license if the individual program lacks the right programmatic accreditation.
Each profession has its own accrediting body with a searchable database.
Law. The American Bar Association maintains a list of approved law schools. Most states require graduation from an ABA-approved school to sit for the bar exam.11American Bar Association. ABA-Approved Law Schools
Nursing. The Commission on Collegiate Nursing Education accredits baccalaureate, master’s, DNP, and other nursing programs, searchable by program type.12American Association of Colleges of Nursing. CCNE – Accredited Programs
Engineering. ABET accredits engineering, computing, and applied science programs, with a search tool covering both current and past accredited programs.13ABET. Find Programs – ABET
When you search these databases, pay attention to which degree level is covered. A school might hold CCNE accreditation for its master’s nursing program but not its bachelor’s, or ABET accreditation for mechanical engineering but not software engineering. Programmatic accreditation applies at the individual program and degree level, not across a whole department.
If an online search leaves you uncertain, contact the school’s registrar and ask for a formal letter confirming the program’s accreditation. Any legitimate school will provide this. Reluctance to produce documentation is itself a red flag.
State Authorization Is Not Accreditation
A school “authorized” or “licensed” to operate in a state has met that state’s minimum legal requirements to run a business offering education. That is not accreditation. State approval means the state allows the school to exist. Accreditation means an independent agency has evaluated the school’s academic quality against established standards. In most states, a school can be authorized to operate without holding any accreditation at all.14Council for Higher Education Accreditation. State Licensed or Authorized Institutions
Some questionable schools lean on state authorization in marketing, using phrases like “approved by the State Department of Education” to imply a quality review that hasn’t happened. If a school emphasizes state approval but stays quiet about accreditation, run the three verification steps above before you send in a deposit.
What Happens If a School Loses Accreditation
When an accrediting agency places a school on probation or revokes its accreditation, the agency notifies the Department of Education, state licensing agencies, and the public. The school itself must disclose probation or adverse action to current and prospective students within seven business days.5U.S. Department of Education. Accreditation Handbook – Department of Education Schools don’t always publicize bad news, which is why running your own check matters.
If you’re already enrolled at a school that loses accreditation or shuts down before you finish your degree, you may qualify for a discharge of your federal student loans. The Department of Education can discharge Direct Loans when a borrower didn’t complete their program because the school closed, and the loss of institutional accreditation counts as an exceptional circumstance for these purposes.15eCFR. 34 CFR 685.214 – Closed School Discharge
DAPIP also retains records for closed institutions, so you can use it to verify the historical accreditation status of a school that no longer operates. That matters if an employer or licensing board later asks you to prove your school was accredited during the years you attended.