At their June 6 and 7, 2020 meeting, the Canadian Engineering Accreditation Board (CEAB) approved the Accountability in Accreditation Evaluation Strategy for implementation starting this month. Through this strategy, the CEAB will assess the effectiveness, trustworthiness, transparency, and efficiency of the accreditation process. In 2019, you may have responded to a survey or participated in an interview seeking your perspectives on how to assess the accreditation system. Your feedback on the qualities of a well-functioning accreditation system and the benefits and purposes of accreditation have informed the final outcomes, indicators, measures, and questions asked of stakeholders which are key to the evaluation strategy.
The implementation of the strategy has begun with surveys having been sent to the Deans of Engineering (or equivalent) at the 14 institutions who received an accreditation visit in the 2019/2020 cycle. Deans, the designated official for this visit, and/or the program accreditation lead(s) are invited to complete the survey and offer their perspectives.
In the coming weeks, a survey will be sent to all provincial and territorial regulators asking for their perspectives on the effectiveness, trustworthiness, transparency, and efficiency of the accreditation process.
We will continue to collect feedback from stakeholder groups including accreditation visiting team members and institutions receiving accreditation visits in the upcoming cycle. Results from the Accountability in Accreditation Evaluation process will be analyzed by the Committee and an annual report will be made available to all stakeholders starting in 2021.
Over the summer, we will make available to all stakeholders a summary of the overall strategy including the outcomes of the accreditation system, measures of those outcomes, questions asked of all stakeholders on feedback forms, data collection plans, timelines, analysis plans, and reporting plans.
