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The Tennessean Still Misleading about TSU Accreditation
July 12th, 2010
Months after having been rebuked by the certifying body itself for its reporting, the Tennessean hasn’t changed its tone much. Not as bombastic this time around, yet still slanting the tenure of its reporting on the situation in the direction of accreditation doom and gloom for Tennessee State University.
The reaffirmation review process of the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools accreditation (SACSA) is a nearly year long process, that as stated in my previous article on the subject, is “a routine review that necessarily takes place every ten years in order to affirm and maintain accreditation, and that all accredited universities need go through.”
The Tennesseans new article this morning states it premise as follows:
A major measurement of Tennessee State University’s effectiveness will be decided in December when the school learns whether it earned reaccreditation.
It’s been a bumpy road. Two reports from the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools, which grants the certification, found TSU doesn’t meet the basic qualifications to be reaccredited. School officials have until August to respond to the findings.
Again, as previously corrected in my April article:
Having seen the inaccuracy of the Tennessean article, President Wheelan of the review body sent a letter to the paper’s publishers correcting the misstatements and misrepresentations. This letter was sent on March 12, the day after the “TSU has hurdles to accreditation” article appeared…
..the Tennessean has now at least published a response piece by Tennessee State University President Dr. Melvin N. Johnson entitled “TSU not in danger of losing accreditation”.
Dr. Johnson states in his piece that the initial Tennessean article “led with a headline that even the president of TSU’s accrediting body, the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools, or SACS, described as “not only false, but misleading.” Dr. Johnson explains the multi-level reaffirmation process, which as of the March 11th Tennessean article, TSU had only gone through the first step. Dr. Johnson reports that “TSU’s on-site visit took place March 23-25 and went very well. The on-site reviewers commended TSU’s reaffirmation team and described our Quality Enhancement Plan as “an outstanding plan.”
Both in its tone and its insinuations of the reality of the matter, the Tennessean continues to mislead with this latest article. The article claims that Dr. Johnson’s letter was in response to the SACSA’s reaffirmation report. To the contrary, his letter was in response to the Tennessean and its false reporting about the SACSA report.
The Tennesseans reporting was so flawed that it moved SACSA review commission President Belle S. Wheelan to write a letter stating that the Tennessean reporting was “not only false, but misleading.” Yet, the Tennessean seems bent on pushing a storyline of a subpar Tennessee State possibly soon to lose its accreditation; when in contrast the story is that TSU is highly unlikely to lose any accreditation or have any serious issues with SACSA. In actuality it seems that this process is serving more as an opportunity for TSU to strengthen its checks and balances, procedures, and academic operations; rather than to have any negative outcomes.
The Tennessean even continues to call the process a reaccreditation review when Dr. Wheelan’s letter back in March specifically noted to the Tennessean that this is a reaffirmation review.
The greatest negative outcome that seems likely from this review process is the derogatory view of Tennessee State being fostered by the Tennessean.
For a demonstration of the socio-politics driving the coverage of TSU, see GenmaSpeaks’ article on the lack of media coverage the University of Tennessee received concerning the problems revealed in UT’s audit.
posted in Education, News & Events, Racial Injustice | | | View blog reactions |
3 Responses to “The Tennessean Still Misleading about TSU Accreditation”
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Yobachi Boswell is creator and publisher of BlackPerspecitve.net. I’m a writer, activist and political watcher based in Nashville, Tennessee. I’ve also been know to do some spoken word and MCing in my day.
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Remember its all about fear mongoring…so long as they can manipulate the thoughts of regular people that will help them put energy towards their desired fate (which is obviously TSU loosing its accreditation) than they will continue to do so. Unfortunately, you have some people that won’t question what they read in the almight media. The sad saga continues…
Aphropik, thanks for stopping by and commenting.
I think there are obviously political plans behind devaluing TSU in the eyes of the public. It’s a priming of the pump for some kind of takeover of the university from it’s historic stake holders.
This’ll be the excuse to merge it with MTSU or something of that nature.