I haven't updated this blog in awhile but when I have more pictures and such to share than can fit in a newsletter, it seems like the best way to share those. 

So at Bethesda Nursing Academy we recently went through an accreditation site visit for LAM-PTKes (Indonesia’s independent accreditation agency that evaluates and assures the quality of higher education programs in the health sciences, such as nursing, medicine, and public health.) We are accredited by two organizations, with the second one being from government's education ministry. Both of these accreditations last five years and they both need to be done this year. 

The accreditation process starts by submitting documents through an online portal. That has been in process since late last year. Once those are all submitted and reviewed then they scheduled a site visit by two assessors. We expected that to happen after the Ramadan fasting month but our lead assessor was from Bali and Hindu, so he went ahead and scheduled it sooner. Our second assessor was from Palembang and Muslim, so she was fasting during the day. 

This process is very formal in Indonesia and we spent a lot of time getting things ready. Every five years they change the process slightly, so each time you have to be ready for something slightly different. For me that meant making sure our skills lab was as ready as possible, as I am in charge of that. We don't actually use our skills lab in the way it is in the standards because we are short on space. So that meant we had to do a lot of shifting things around and getting things ready. Thankfully, I had some help from other staff and some students. 

So here is the process in pictures: 

Ready and waiting to welcome the assessors 

The formal welcome from our director, Nora. 

They then toured the campus, including the skills lab. There I and the director answered their questions about our facilities and programs. They were less than impressed with some of our old equipment and lack of space. They even at one point suggested we open a museum with some of our equipment 😁 

The following morning we had an official opening ceremony with speeches etc. 

They spent the rest of that day interviewing different groups, from the leadership and the secretary of our board, to teachers, alumni, and current students. They also interviewed people from our local government clinic and hospital that work with our students. This is the newer model of accreditation that focuses on qualitative methods. 

The follow morning they reviewed our documents with us. Each group had to go forward and show their documents and explain them. 

The assessors then met together to discuss their findings and type them up. Following that they shared their findings with us and gave us a chance to respond to them. Then we had a closing ceremony and took our final pictures together. 

But we also did manage to have some fun together in the midst of it all! 

And now we wait for results. It will take about a month for committee to review all the documents and also the results from the site visit. There are three possible outcomes:

• Unggul (Excellent Accreditation): This is the highest accreditation level, meaning the program demonstrates excellent quality in education, faculty, facilities, clinical training, and outcomes, and exceeds national standards.
• Terakreditasi (Accredited): This means the program meets the national standards for health education and is recognized as providing acceptable quality education, but it does not yet reach the highest level.
• Tidak Terakreditasi (Not Accredited): This means the program does not currently meet the required national standards for health education and must make improvements before it can receive accreditation. 

We are praying at least for accredited and would love an excellent score but also know that we don't meet some of the standards. In the final speech from our assessor who was Muslim, she acknowledged the effort we had made by not eating and drinking in front of her and said felt welcomed and respected by this despite the fact we are obviously a Christian institution. It was a good reminder that we can share our faith and care through our actions.