It’s always good sense to ask which schools offer an accredited diploma online, since it makes no sense to earn a diploma that no one will recognize. There are fortunately a growing number of schools that are accredited by appropriate agencies. One way to find out which ones exist is to begin searching through these agencies.
In the US, all schools offering an accredited diploma online are considered accredited if an agency approved by the US Department of Education grants accreditation to them. Note that it only takes one of these agencies to make a school accredited. For online learning, students might want to start with the Distance Education Training Council. This has a number of school listings. Alternately, accrediting agencies include those that are accredited regionally or by geographic area, but which still count countrywide. People can look to the following list: Middle States Association of Schools and Colleges, New England Association of Schools and Colleges, North Central Association on Accreditation and School Improvement, Northwest Association of Schools and Colleges, Southern Association of Schools and Colleges, and Western Association of Schools and Colleges.
It’s important to note that these agencies approve schools and have tested them to make certain they come up to predefined standards. As mentioned, it isn’t necessary to search through every one of these boards. The US Department of Education has several links to online school directories so people can find schools where they can earn an accredited diploma online and the Distance Education Training Council has a searchable index on their website.
Other countries may each have their own accrediting agencies, which can help students determine whether they can get an accredited diploma online from a particular school. One thing of note is that diplomas are different depending on country, and might not always be recognized as quite the same, and conferring the same privileges so that people could go on to study in degree programs. Sometimes two countries have similar programs and may automatically recognize a diploma earned by a person in either country. This could mean that a diploma earned at a Canadian school might be equivalent or very near to one earned at a US school. It could widen the field of possible schools to attend that offer an accredited diploma online.
Most of this discussion has focused on the diploma, as is usually earned by graduating high school students. It should be noted there are also agencies that accredit colleges that operate online and many of these can be searched through the same databases. Yet in the US, people also might want to search the Council of Higher Education Accreditation for reputable colleges. Lastly, it isn’t always necessary to search for schools through an accreditation agency. People can use their search engines, which will return lots of results, find the schools they like, and then verify one or more schools’ status through accrediting agencies.
