It’s taken months of collaboration across institutions, but east Tennessee’s only Historically Black College and University (HBCU) is on track to regain accreditation. The college is anticipating submitting its application for approval in April.
Knoxville College (KC), a private institution, lost its accreditation in 1997. Since then, it has regained authorized status in Tennessee, which allows them to confer credentials. If the school is able to regain accreditation, as those involved believe will happen soon, students will be able to access federal financial aid funding and state funding opportunities, including the Tennessee Student Assistance Award, which offers repayment-free financial aid to students from low-income backgrounds.
“KC lost accreditation for a number of reasons, one of those being financial stability. Financial aid for students is one of the largest conduits of state dollars to the institution,” said Dr. Brittany Mosby, director of HBCU Success, a branch of the Tennessee Higher Education Commission focused on the health and sustainability of the state’s seven private and public HBCUs. “In the 2021 school year, about $10 million went to HBCUs in the state through financial aid, and the year before that it was $12 million. That’s one of the reasons why accreditation is so important.”
Dr. Dasha Lundy, executive vice president and chief operations officer of Knoxville College and District 1 Commissioner for the Knox County Commission.
Lundy said Dr. Kevin James, president of MBC, was an inspiration.
“He did it, so we can do it too,” said Lundy. She reached out and asked James if he would help KC in its mission to regain accreditation. “[James] believes in HBCUs, so he said yes. He’d been through it and he knew the pitfalls. He knew how to guide the team. If we did this by ourselves, it would have took longer.”
Lundy said it was James who reached out across town to connect with the University of Tennessee (UT) Knoxville. Dr. J. Patrick Biddix, professor and program coordinator of the Higher Education Administration Ph.D. program at UT Knoxville, said he was excited for the chance to collaborate with KC, not only so his students could get hands on experience in the process of accreditation, but to help an institution as important as KC.
