EHOVE Career Center has gained reaffirmation of accreditation for another six years by the Council on Occupational Education (COE) for 20 of the school’s adult education occupational programs. The school is proud to announce that the rigorous accreditation review produced zero findings, a very impressive yet uncommon result.
EHOVE was previously accredited in 2013 for a six year period by COE, who have been assuring quality and integrity in career tech education since 1971.
Accreditation is an assurance that programs have undergone an extensive review process and meet high standards and conditions in curriculum assessment procedures, safety, health and how resources are used. Occupational programs are also required to have an emphasis on hands-on and classroom learning.
The preparation for the accreditation review takes two years to complete. Steering committee members attended training classes and reviewed standards at the beginning of the process. In advance of the review by the five-person team from COE, the committee worked with staff to gather evidence from school records. They used this information to write a self study, which is basically an in-depth review of everything the adult education department does.
Outside of a pandemic, accreditation reviews are in person. This year’s virtual evaluation was more challenging than the previous review for the 2013 accreditation. COE reviewers were in four different time zones, including Alaska and Saudi Arabia, so providing live action video for the extensive review of classrooms and labs for 20 occupational programs was complicated.
However, Adult Education Director Laura Dowdell appreciated the situation, saying the virtual visits allowed staff to have a global perspective on career tech education as a whole. She said that a COE team leader will visit EHOVE in person when pandemic restriction changes make it possible.
“I’m very proud of the work of the entire staff,” said Dowdell. “The program coordinators did an amazing job of compiling information required to create their portion of the self-study. The entire adult education staff and district personnel worked together to process everything as a team. Truly, our zero findings audit was due to the hard work of the entire staff.”
Dowdell said many other career centers are working through the COE accreditation process this year. Due to EHOVE’s outstanding results, she and her staff are assisting other schools by guiding them through the planning and organization steps of the process.
To learn more about the Council on Occupational Education, go to www.council.org.
For more information, contact EHOVE’s Business & Community Partnerships Office at 419-499-4663 x258.