Accreditation provides assurance that a college or university program meets the quality standards of the profession for which that program prepares graduates. Accreditation of engineering and computing programs ensures programs meet standards to produce graduates ready to enter technical fields that are leading the way in innovation and emerging technologies.
The Computer Science and Information Technology undergraduate programs program will be seeking initial accreditation by the Computing Accreditation Commission of ABET, www.abet.org, in the 2025-26 accreditation cycle. The Software Engineering undergraduate program is preparing to seek for an initial accreditation by the Engineering Accreditation Commission.
One component of the accreditation criteria requires each program pursuing accreditation to formulate Program Educational Objectives in consultation with their program-defined constituents. ABET defines Program Educational Objectives as “broad statements that describe what graduates are expected to attain within a few years after graduation.”
Another component of ABET accreditation requires programs specify Student Outcomes, which “describe what students are expected to know and be able to do by the time of graduation. These relate to the knowledge, skills, and behaviors that students acquire as they progress through the program.”
ABET is committed to Continuous Improvement and all programs must assess and evaluate the extent to which their Student Outcomes are being attained and use the results of these evaluations for the continuous improvement of the program.
ABET requires that each program make available to the public certain information, namely their Program Educational Objectives, their Student Outcomes, their accreditation status, and data on their student enrollments and degrees granted.
