The NEASC defines its accreditation process as follows: “Accreditation has two interrelated purposes, school improvement and quality assurance.” These two goals are addressed in a three-phase process The first phase is a Self-Study done by each member school every ten years (to be completed at least a month before phase two). Phase two is the Visiting Committee that spends parts of four days on the campus of the school being accredited. Finally, phase three is the follow-up that is required by the NEASC to the recommendations for improvement and/or adherence to the Association’s Standards.

The Self-Study is a very thorough, yearlong, self-reflection organized around the fifteen major Standards that each school will be evaluated on. The Standards are: Mission, Governance, Enrollment, Academic Program, Experience of the Students, Resources to Support the Program, Residential Program, Faculty, Administration, Evaluation and Assessment, Health and Safety, Communication, Infrastructure, and the Accreditation Process. First a school establishes its own internal Steering Committee to organize and manage the work that needs to be done to complete the Self-Study. We already have a Steering Committee in place for our Self-Study. The members of the Self-Study Steering Committee are: Dr. John F. Fox, Chair, Antonio Viva, Ron Cino, Joel Strogoff, Susanne Carpenter, Barbara Ahalt and me. This committee will begin dividing the faculty and staff into fifteen committees (one for each Standard) this Spring. Each committee will gather data and meet frequently between June 2010 and April 2011. Each committee will have to rate Worcester Academy on how it is meeting the Standard on a six-point scale – from Exemplary to Non-compliance and write a summary of the school’s position with regard to that Standard. The final draft of the Self-Study will be ready by June, 2011 and mailed to the NEASC and the Visiting Committee the August before the actual visit.

Who makes up the Visiting Committee? This group is chosen by the NEASC Commission on Independent Schools (there are 612 independent schools in the NEASC). The Chair of the visit is chosen at least eighteen months before the visit and the remaining eight to eleven committee members are selected approximately six months before the visit. All chairs must be sitting Heads of School of NEASC schools and the rest of the committee is made up of current faculty and staff of NEASC member schools.

This process is exhausting but extremely rewarding. I hope this has shed some light on a subject that is critical to the improvement of our schools.

- Dexter Morse, Head of School

Worcester Academy weathered the recession in pretty good shape. We trimmed as much “fat” out of the operating budget as we could without affecting the academic program. We did not have to let any staff go for budget reasons and everyone was offered small raises. We anticipated and budgeted for an increase in financial aid requests. We slowed down plans to begin new construction at the St. Vincent property and extended the length of the Capital Campaign by two years. We were able to reduce institutional debt and improved our financial resources to debt ratio. The Admission Office anticipated a lowering of enrollment yield per accepted student and increased the acceptance pool accordingly. In the end we had a very successful admission year. We will open on September 2 with a full school.

Our institutional goals this year include working to implement our new strategic plan, doing a thorough facility needs plan, gearing up for the New England Association of Schools and Colleges ten-year reaccreditation, and continuing to improve our position as a leader in an innovative, 21^st Century independent school curriculum.

I am as excited about starting the new academic year as I can ever remember being. I hope you are also ready for the challenge.

- Dexter Morse, Head of School