CAAHEP Accreditation: What "Seeking Accreditation" Means for Applicants

Last reviewed September 5, 2026 · Sourced from ARC-AA, CAAHEP, the NCCAA certification handbook, state licensing statutes, and program disclosures.

Of the 30 campuses in our program directory, 25 hold CAAHEP accreditation and 5 at 5 institutions are still seeking it. New programs are opening faster than at any point in the profession's history, so a growing share of applicants face the question this page answers: what does it mean to enroll before accreditation is granted, and what actually depends on it?

Who Accredits CAA Programs

The Commission on Accreditation of Allied Health Education Programs (CAAHEP) is the only nationally recognized accreditor of anesthesiologist assistant education. It does not review programs itself. The Accreditation Review Committee for the Anesthesiologist Assistant (ARC-AA) evaluates each program against the CAAHEP Standards and Guidelines for AA programs and makes a recommendation, and the CAAHEP board votes on that recommendation at one of its six meetings a year.

How a New Program Earns Accreditation

ARC-AA describes the path in nine steps. Condensed, a program:

1. files a Request for Accreditation Services with CAAHEP;
2. writes a self-study documenting how it meets every standard;
3. receives ARC-AA's written analysis and responds to it;
4. hosts a one- to two-day site visit and responds to the visit team's findings;
5. is reviewed by the ARC-AA board, which sends its recommendation to CAAHEP;
6. receives the CAAHEP board's decision, then files a mandatory annual report every year after.

Programs that are past the first step but before the last are the ones CASAA and this site label as seeking accreditation. In practice the decision tends to land close to the first cohort's start date. Among the four most recent accreditations recorded in our directory, NEOMED (accredited 2022, first cohort January 2023), Saint Louis University (January 2025, first cohort May 2025), and Kansas City University (September 2025, first cohort January 2026) were accredited before their first students arrived, while UTHealth Houston enrolled its first class in August 2024 and received initial accreditation five months later. Each program page cites the source for those dates.

Campuses Seeking Accreditation Now

Status as we last verified it, from each program's own disclosures; the program page carries the full notes and sources.

• Bluefield University at VCOM — Virginia (Blacksburg) · Blacksburg, VA · verified September 5, 2026
• Burrell College of Health Sciences — Melbourne · Melbourne, FL · verified September 5, 2026

  Burrell, renamed the Burrell College of Health Sciences in June 2026 after earning Higher Learning Commission accreditation in June 2025, told the Las Cruces Bulletin in August 2026 that it plans to enroll the first class in January 2028, that the program has HLC approval and has submitted its accreditation self-study with a site visit expected in spring 2027, and that classroom and simulation training will be based in Melbourne with clinical sites in Florida, New Mexico, and El Paso.

• Lipscomb University — Nashville · Nashville, TN · verified September 5, 2026

  The university is SACSCOC-approved and says it is seeking CAAHEP/ARC-AA accreditation for the program.

• Nova Southeastern University — Nevada (Henderson) · Henderson, NV · verified September 5, 2026

  It is not yet CAAHEP-accredited: NSU says an initial-accreditation site visit is scheduled and notes that is 'neither a status of accreditation nor a guarantee.'

• University of Mary Hardin-Baylor — Belton · Belton, TX · verified September 5, 2026

  The program is not yet accredited: a CAAHEP/ARC-AA initial-accreditation site visit is scheduled, and CASAA lists it as Seeking CAAHEP Accreditation.

What Actually Depends on Accreditation

• State licenses. Licensing statutes commonly require graduation from a CAAHEP-accredited program before a license is issued. Colorado, Washington, Wisconsin, and Missouri all do, and each state page cites the statute. This is the concrete risk of an unaccredited program: a graduate could hold NCCAA certification and still be unable to get licensed in a state whose statute names CAAHEP.
• The certifying exam. The NCCAA's 2025 certification handbook ties exam eligibility to graduating from an anesthesiologist assistant program "offered at an institution that is accredited by an agency recognized by the US Department of Education (USDE) or the Council on Higher Education Accreditation (CHEA)", plus NCCAA's own clinical-experience standards. The handbook does not name CAAHEP; ARC-AA, for its part, describes completing a CAAHEP-accredited program as the route to exam eligibility. Candidates get two years from graduation and six attempts.
• Delegation states. In Texas and Michigan, CAAs practice under physician delegation with no state license, so whether an employer credentials a graduate of a newly accredited program is the employer's decision.

What to Ask a Program That Is Not Accredited Yet

• Has the site visit happened, and which CAAHEP board meeting will consider the recommendation?
• What is the plan for enrolled students if the decision is delayed or negative?
• Do the statutes in the states where you plan to practice require CAAHEP accreditation? Check the state's page here before you enroll.
• Ask for the current status in writing, and confirm it in CAAHEP's directory rather than relying on a brochure.

How to Verify a Program's Status

CAAHEP's find-an-accredited-program directory is the official list, and ARC-AA sends students there. Our directory shows Accredited or Pending for every campus with the date we last verified it, and the badge on each program page links back to this explanation.

Sources

1. ARC-AA — For Students and the Public (CAAHEP as sole recognized accreditor; exam eligibility)
2. ARC-AA — For Programs (the nine-step accreditation process)
3. NCCAA — 2025 Certification Exam Handbook (eligibility, rev. November 8, 2025)
4. NCCAA — Certification Exam Eligibility
5. CAAHEP — Find an Accredited Program
6. State statutes as cited on the Colorado, Washington, Wisconsin, and Missouri pages; program accreditation dates as cited on each program page.