The Western Association of Schools and Colleges (WASC) is one of six regional accrediting associations in the United States. The Association provides assistance to schools located in California, Hawaii, Guam, the Commonwealth of the Northern Marianas, American Samoa, the Federated States of Micronesia, the Republic of the Marshall Islands, Fiji, and East Asia. The Accrediting Commission for Schools has two locations; the main office is located in Burlingame, CA and a satellite office is in Temecula, CA.

The Purpose of Accreditation

Accreditation is a term that originally meant trustworthiness in its middle French, Old Italian usage. The original purpose of accreditation in the United States was designed to encourage the standardization of secondary school programs, primarily to ensure for the benefit of colleges and universities that graduating students had mastered a particular body of knowledge. However, today the process developed by the Accrediting Commission for Schools, Western Association of Schools and Colleges (WASC), involves a dual purpose that continues the expectation that schools must be worthy of the trust placed in them to provide high quality learning opportunities, but with the added requirement that they clearly demonstrate that they are about the critical business of continual self-improvement.

"The greatest value of the WASC protocol is that it ensures equity and fairness to all students in all schools. Parents, teachers, staff members and students participate in a process that enables them to critically self examine their school plan, set their own goals and assess if their goals are reached for continuous improvement."
Susie Chow,
WASC Commissioner, California Federation of Teachers