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ACAOM will consider applications for candidacy and accreditation from programs that meet the following prerequisites:
(a) The program’s purpose must be within the Commission’s scope of recognition and must be pursued in an institutional setting appropriate for doctoral education in Oriental medicine. The program shall be supported by an academic, clinical and administrative infrastructure consonant with the goals and standards of professional doctoral education within the United States;
(b) The program must be sponsored by an institution accredited: (1) by ACAOM; (2) by a nationally recognized regional accrediting agency; or, (3) in the case of Canadian programs, the institution must be publicly recognized by the Association of Universities and Colleges of Canada as a member in good standing;
(c) The program must be offered in an institution that offers a Masters-degree program in acupuncture or Oriental medicine which is accredited by ACAOM or its equivalent ;
(d) The program must be an integral part of the mission of the academic department, college, school or institution in which it resides. The program must be represented in the institution’s operating budget and strategic plans in a manner designed to enable the program to achieve its goals and objectives. The program must have students in sufficient numbers and the facilities necessary to ensure meaningful peer interaction, support and socialization;
(e) The institution in which the program is offered has formal authorization from the appropriate state agency to offer a doctoral degree in Oriental medicine or must actively seek doctoral degree granting status for the Oriental medicine program;
(f) The program must be a minimum of 4000 hours for each doctoral student, which includes the Master’s level training requirements. A minimum of 1200 hours must be at the doctoral level.
(g) The institution must demonstrate that its ACAOM accredited Masters degree program has resolved any outstanding areas of "non-compliance" and "technical non-compliance" and has a plan in place to remedy all outstanding "areas of concern" previously identified by the Commission, and;
(h) The program must conduct its operations with honesty and integrity.
Purpose
ESSENTIAL REQUIREMENT 1: The institution shall have a formally adopted statement of purpose that provides clear direction for the institution, its Master’s degree and doctoral programs. The Master’s program shall have as a formally adopted educational purpose, the preparation of entry-level health care practitioners as acupuncture or Oriental medical professionals. The Doctoral program must have a formally adopted statement of purpose that provides clear direction for the program and is based upon the following principles:
–The program will provide advanced training for the purpose of deepening the practitioner’s existing knowledge and skills and broadening their competencies in core, specialty and clinical areas particularly in the areas of clinical assessment, diagnosis and intervention.
– The program shall impart a deepened ability to apply major Oriental medicine modalities including acupuncture, herbal medicine, qi cultivation and energetics, diet and nutrition and manual therapy.
–The program shall provide opportunities for specialization.
–The program will provide the practitioner with a broadened perspective with which to engage in collaborative interactions between Oriental medicine practitioners and other health care practitioners and patients.
–The program will develop students’ abilities to synthesize knowledge, engage in scientific and scholarly inquiry and to think critically and creatively.
–The program shall provide the competencies necessary to facilitate the growth of knowledge, skills, and attitudes in the Oriental medicine practitioner as a life long learner.
–The program shall encourage the academic discourse between faculty and students which results in the development of an academic community that will enrich and advance the profession, and contribute to the development of future generations of practitioners, faculty, researchers, clinical supervisors and leaders of the profession.
Criterion 1.1 - Relationship: The program must demonstrate that its resources, and its current or projected programs, services and activities are consistent with its statement of purpose, and that the institution is currently achieving its goals and purposes.
Guideline: The statement of purpose should guide the adoption of priorities in allocating resources, and should ensure consistency in the conduct of the institution's activities.
Criterion 1.2 - Review: The statement of purpose must be reviewed periodically by the institution’s relevant communities of interest, and revised, when necessary, to ensure its relevance and accuracy.
Guideline: The reexamination of purpose should determine whether programs are relevant to stated purposes, whether they are being fulfilled, and whether the statement is understood adequately by all those involved. This review process should be accomplished by representatives of the student body, faculty, administration, governing board, acupuncturists and Oriental medicine practitioners and other appropriate members of the community.
Criterion 1.3 - Educational Objectives: The program must maintain clearly specified and measurable educational objectives which reflect the effects the educational program is designed to have on students and are consistent with its purpose and with the degree or certificate it awards. The educational objectives must provide the parameters within which the program's instructional activities can be verified through its evaluation processes.
Legal Organization
ESSENTIAL REQUIREMENT 2: The program shall be in a legally organized institution and authorized to conduct its operation under the laws of its own state and community as far as the state and community provide for such authorization, and shall be in compliance with all local, state and federal regulations applicable to it. The institution in which the program is a part must have or actively pursue doctoral degree granting status for the program with the appropriate state authorities.
Governance
ESSENTIAL REQUIREMENT 3: The composition of the governance structure of the institution must be appropriate to an institution offering doctoral education.
Criterion 3.1 - Off-Campus Activities: The institution must be directly responsible for all of its off-campus educational activities, regardless of whether the activity has been arranged by agreement with other organizations or individuals. If components of the program are conducted at sites geographically separated from the main campus or the program is offered through a consortium at separate sites, the institution(s) and consortium must ensure that all educational components and services of the program are equivalent in quality. Any agreement with the institution for off-campus training or for the establishment of consortiums must be consistent with the school’s mission.
Criterion 3.2 - Consortium:
A doctoral program may only be offered by a college or program that is ACAOM accredited and in good standing. Such schools or programs may formally agree to pool resources to offer a doctoral program in the form of a consortium. A consortium comprises multiple independently-administered entities which have, in writing, formally agreed to pool resources to conduct a doctoral training program. Written consortium agreements must articulate:
a) The nature and characteristics of the participating entities;
a) The rationale for the formation of the consortium;
a) Each partner’s commitment to the training/educational program, its philosophy, model, and goals;
a) Each partner’s obligations regarding contributions and access to resources;
a) Each partner’s adherence to central control and coordination of the training program; and,
a) Each partner’s commitment to uniform administration and implementation of the program’s training principles, policies, and procedures addressing trainee/student admission, financial support, training resource access, potential performance expectations, and evaluations.
Administration
ESSENTIAL REQUIREMENT 4: The program shall have a qualified program director whose full-time or major responsibility is to the program and a qualified administrative staff of a size and organizational structure that is appropriate to the size and purpose of the program.
Criterion 4.1 - Organization of staff: The administrative staff must be stable, qualified, and well organized with clearly defined roles and responsibilities. Individuals in the organization should be knowledgeable of their responsibilities and aware of those of each of the other principal positions in the administrative structure.
Criterion 4.2 - Academic Leadership: The program must have a clearly defined and effective structure for academic leadership to facilitate curriculum development and the ongoing assessment of the program. The individuals responsible for the academic leadership of the program must be qualified for those positions.
a) The program shall designate a qualified individual responsible for the educational aspects of the doctoral program. This position will provide oversight of the doctoral program including faculty hiring, in-service training and evaluation as well as responsibility for overall academic affairs including curriculum development, evaluation and quality assurance. This individual shall possess a doctorate from an accredited institution. This individual shall also have competence in dealing with the issues of doctoral level education in the United States or Canada.
b) The program shall designate a qualified clinical director, as documented through significant education, training and professional experience appropriate to doctoral level training, who is responsible for the oversight and coordination of all doctoral clinical education activities.
Guideline: A qualified clinical director should have a minimum of 10 years of documented professional experience as a practitioner.
c) All individuals responsible for the leadership of the program (e.g., program director, academic dean, clinical director) must hold tenured or senior appointments at the institution and must be role models for faculty, staff and students as demonstrated (in addition to licensure/certification) by recognition or distinction within professional organizations or their field(s) of expertise. They should possess documented qualifications through education, training and professional experience appropriate to their respective roles.
Records
ESSENTIAL REQUIREMENT 5: The program shall have accurate and complete record keeping systems.
Criterion 5.1 - Permanent Records: Observing the requirements of right-to-privacy legislation, the program must maintain and safeguard accurate permanent academic records that reasonably document the satisfaction of program requirements. The program must have a written plan for storage of permanent student records in the event that the institution closes.
Criterion 5.2 - Clinical Records: The program must maintain clinical records of patients currently being seen by students which are accurate, secured, complete and are kept confidential with respect to the generally accepted standards of healthcare practice. Clinical charts must be signed by the student and the supervisor. To maintain the highest level of patient care through accessibility to patient records by all current and future care givers, the program must have provisions for translating patient records into English or, where mandated, into the language of the country or province in which the program is located if patient clinical records are recorded in other languages.
Criterion 5.3 - Data: The program must maintain data that will facilitate the compilation of the following records and statistics: student profiles showing number of students enrolled, graduated and readmitted; admissions data showing the number of applications received and accepted; and ages, sex, educational backgrounds, and racial origins (optional reporting by student when permitted by law) of the student body.
Admissions
ESSENTIAL REQUIREMENT 6: The program must have admission policies, procedures and practices that are appropriate for doctoral education. Admissions policies, procedures and practices must result in a body of matriculated students who are capable of meeting the rigors of a doctoral program in Oriental medicine.
Criterion 6.1 - Standard Admissions: The program shall have implemented an admissions policy that as a prerequisite for the admission into the professional doctoral program requires the satisfactory completion of a Master’s degree or Master’s level program in Oriental medicine from an ACAOM-accredited or candidate institution or its equivalent.
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