Lacking a government body providing guidance or mandated processes for the acceptance of foreign credentials and credits, U.S. higher education institutions (HEIs) maintain a great deal of autonomy. This allows them to make the admissions and transfer credit decisions that best fit their type, size, mission, and level.
Without official regulation, HEIs follow standards of best practice such as those published in
AACRAO EDGE. These resources provide general guidelines, placement recommendations, and best practices to help HEIs make admissions decisions that place international students accurately, fairly, and support their academic success.
However, as technology removes the barriers to academic mobility, HEIs must question if the U.S. international admissions and credential evaluation community can and should maintain this unstructured way of working.