External Confirmation of Adherence to Standards: As Applicable to Academic Programmes as to Business and Industry

The development of, and adherence to, performance standards is imperative for success in today's competitive global market. This is as true for academic programmes in higher education as it is for the manufacturing and service sectors. Just like their counterparts in business and industry, it is important that graduate career preparation programmes are subject to an external validation process that can substantiate whether or not they are indeed following applicable standards. In this paper the authors discuss the current status of accreditation for graduate programmes designed to prepare tomorrow's leaders in the student services profession and argue for the development of a new certification system based on the standards established by the US Council for the Advancement of Standards (CAS).