On April 1st, the Department of Education released the final set of proposed regulations stemming from the 2019 Negotiated Rulemaking process (April Fools!). Back in April, WCET published three blog posts outlining the proposed regulations on April 3rd, April 6th, and April 13th. I know that seems like a lifetime ago but many of us have been anxiously awaiting the release of the final regulations. Well, the Department finally decided to release those regulations late Monday, August 24th.

SURPRISE!

This is the third and final part of WCET’s analysis of the proposed rules. Part one of our analysis details the proposed changes to the distance education definition, including regular and substantive interaction here, and part two details proposed changes to the credit hour, week of instruction, and calculating correspondence students here. The final portion of our analysis will be focusing on the proposed changes that will impact direct assessment and competency-based education programs. For a more comprehensive review of how we got here, check out all of our blog posts on the 2019 negotiated rulemaking process.

If you attended last year’s WCET Annual Meeting in Denver, you may remember that Under Secretary Diane Auer Jones mentioned proposed changes to the definition of a credit hour and how surprised she was that so few people seemed to be paying attention to that part of the consensus language. At the time, changes to accreditation and state authorization as well as the consensus language around the new definition of distance education was dominating the conversation and no one was giving much thought to any changes to the credit hour definition, but now that this last bucket of proposed regulations has finally been released, we have a chance to better understand what the Under Secretary was referring to.

On March 5, 2020, the Department of Education issued guidance to institutions facing possible interruptions of study because of COVID-19. WCET’s Cheryl Dowd, Director of the WCET State Authorization Network, provided an overview of the guidance for WCET Frontiers. As of the morning of March 12th, a growing number of institutions, especially those on the west coast, have opted to at least temporarily suspend face-to-face instruction and transition coursework to remote delivery.

Earlier this year, the Department of Education engaged in negotiated rulemaking around several issues including state authorization and reciprocity, accreditation, distance education and innovation, regular and substantive interaction, competency-based education (CBE), TEACH grants, and faith-based institutions. Despite all odds and expectations, negotiators reached consensus on a comprehensive set of proposed regulations. In July of 2019, the Department released the first of three sets of proposed rules for public comment—those rules concerning state authorization, reciprocity, public disclosures, and accreditation. On October 31st, the Department responded to almost 200 public comments and released final regulations.