Accounting Accreditation: Value Added Or Waste Of Resources?

In a forthcoming paper Everard, Edmonds, and St. Pierre (2014) question whether the AACSB has achieved its mission of recognizing excellence in business education and whether it has shown continuous improvement in its efforts since the change to a mission driven focus. In this paper, the authors expand on this topic and address the value of accounting accreditation from the perspective of the market it serves, whether accounting accreditation has diminished in value because of the quality of the programs being accredited, and whether accounting accreditation is an idea that has run its course. We conclude that since the move to a mission driven focus, the AACSB has diminished its brand, has failed in its ability to differentiate quality accounting programs in the higher education market, and has not met its objective of continuous improvement for the organization itself. Unless changes are made in the organization, its value in the higher education marketplace will diminish over time and the brand could become irrelevant.