On Tuesday, June 14, 2016, the Kansas State Board of Education voted to approve Kansas Education Systems Accreditation (KESA).

CLICK HERE FOR ALL KESA INFORMATION.

Kansas Statute 72-6439(a) charges the Kansas State Board of Education with the accreditation of schools, a process that provides official recognition of the school as having met a defined set of standards. Current accreditation regulations in Kansas are based on a school accreditation model called Kansas Education Systems Accreditation (KESA), which was aproved in 2016. 

All public schools in the state of Kansas are required to participate in the state accreditation process. On the other hand, private schools are not required to do so. However, ALL private schools are required, through Kansas Statute 72-53, 101(a), to register with KSDE.

A list of private schools operating in Kansas that do participate in the state's accreditation process is available in the menu at the lower right of this page. These schools are referred to as "Accredited Private Schools." Private schools that do not participate in the state accreditation process are referred to as "Non-Accredited Private Schools (NAPS)."  The list of NAPS that is accessible from the link at the lower right is not exhaustive. There are likely other NAPS in Kansas that have not registered with KSDE in accordance with state statute. Click here  for more information about NAPS in Kansas.

The State Board receives recommendations concerning K-12 accreditation from the KSDE Accreditation Advisory Council, a group of representatives from all facets and levels of education and from all regions of Kansas.

The previous accreditation regulations were based on a model called Quality Performance Accreditation (QPA), which relied on a combination of the individual school's performance on state assessments and its ability to meet 11 Quality Assurances. The system was developed in 1992 and was modified in 2005.