Massage Regulation in MN

Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Jason Erickson on August 16, 2010 at 10:32pm

I fail to see why ABMP is dead-set against requiring massage schools to be accredited. Accreditation is the norm among all forms of professional/vocational/technical/higher education institutions. If ABMP is truly interested in the long-term growth and professional development of massage, they should be pushing for mandatory accreditation for all massage schools.

The language of the proposed legislation doesn't require all practitioners to be graduates of accredited schools, anyway. It clearly recognizes that practitioners from unaccredited massage schools will apply and can be approved. There are also a number of ways that experienced practitioners may be grandfathered in, regardless of what type of training they had years ago.

As a voluntary registration, practitioners will not have to participate unless they choose to. Folks who practice asian bodywork and other non-massage modalities will be exempt from this law unless they wish to advertise themselves as a "Registered Massage Therapist" - so none of them will be affected by passage of this legislation.

For complete information on the current version of the bill, go to www.almt.synthasite.com

Let's get it together and finally get massage therapy registration passed in 2011. It's way past time we brought some sense to Minnesota's statewide regulatory insanity. This bill is a big step forward for all Minnesota MTs!

Permalink Reply by Emmanuel Bistas on August 17, 2010 at 6:49am

ABMP's rationale can be found here

Copying from the above link: "In some professions, school accreditation is the norm. Nearly 100 percent of four-year colleges, for example, are accredited. That is not the norm among massage schools today. Only 676 of the 1575 (43%) state-approved massage schools are accredited by one or more of the seven bodies approved by the U.S. Department of Education to accredit massage programs. Chances are a massage therapist moving to Minnesota has not graduated from an accredited program and will have difficultly becoming registered."

Also from the same link: "...There are only three states nationwide that only license graduates of accredited massage schools, all three have clearly documented problems because of this policy. .."

As the owner of one of those 57% of schools that have not gone through voluntary accreditation, I am grateful to ABMP for taking this position. My school has been a member of AMTA and ABMP since 2002. This year, I nearly did not renew my school's AMTA membership when I found out that AMTA sponsored this bill.

As a profession we are working very hard these days to eliminate myths.. Flushing out toxins? Pregnancy massage in the first trimester? We are starting to rely on research and evidence before making statements to our clients.

But are those the only myths that we hear? How about myths related to accreditation, number of hours, etc... Is an accredited school really better than a non-accredited one? Is a 750-hour training better than a 650-hour program? Is medical massage therapeutic, while relaxation is not? I think we should be able to substantiate why accreditation, which is a voluntary process, should be mandated by the state.

There are way too many factors affecting quality, to simply rely on accreditation. The career schools that are currently in the spotlight for defrauding students are all accredited, no?

Permalink Reply by Jason Erickson on September 1, 2010 at 11:55pm

As previously noted, there are a number of ways that graduates from unaccredited massage schools could pass the standards set out in the bill.

In the long run, shouldn't all schools be striving for accreditation? If not, why would that be considered acceptable?

Assuming that your own school provides a quality education, how do you feel about being lumped in with other schools that do not?

Other than accreditation, what would be a more equitable and reliable basic standard for massage schools? When formulating your answer, please realize that licensing bodies and employers need a very simple and easily verified standard for evaluating the quality of an applicant's scholastic training.

I don't know if there are any easy answers to these and other questions. I am interested to learn more about your perspective, so I hope you take the time to reply.

What accredited career schools have been accused of defrauding students? (Seriously, I have no idea - got links?)

The next legislative cycle is coming up in a few months. Let's resolve some differences and get some sane regulations passed in Minnesota!!!

Permalink Reply by Emmanuel Bistas on September 10, 2010 at 7:53pm

Jason,

I did not see your reply, I am sorry it took me so long to post.

Starting with your last question about accredited schools defrauding students, I am talking about the Dept. of Education's proposed changes regarding gainful employment, default rates, etc. Information on the problem and proposed changes can be found here .

Unfortunately, the issue that DOE's proposals are trying to address have been referred to as a problem with "for profit" schools, rather than what it is, an issue with schools (for profit and non-for-profit) that take advantage of federal aid dollars (and student loans that are g...

Accreditation is the gatekeeper to Title IV funds, and the reason it is the gatekeeper is because of the notion that an independent body with standards related to processes, completion and placement rates, etc. will function as an objective school evaluator. Accredited schools are supposed to be good schools, right? Well, the current situation shows that at least in the case of several schools accreditation did not protect students, ensure program quality, etc.

I agree there should be standards, of course. But what standards are we talking about? education standards? retention standards? completion rates? and who should set those standards? ABHES? COMTA? ACCSCT? NCBTMB? State Boards? State Departments of Education? I hope that AFMTE will help with educational standards and that is why I took a good chunk of my very small budget and became a founding member of that organization when it got started. I think educational/curriculum standards should come from a body that focuses on education.

Should all schools strive for accreditation in the long run? When states can no longer regulate schools well, probably. But the accreditation process and associated costs would need to change for that to happen. What I did to ensure quality, was that in 2003 I hired an accreditation consultant to see what we are doing and made some changes based on his recommendations. Several times since then, I (or someone from my staff) has gone to COMTA accreditation workshops. But seriously, other than access to Title IV funds, what would accreditation give to the students? One of the brochures that I received by an accrediting organization last year said it like it is: it didn't say "take the first step to be a better school by becoming accredited", it said "take the first step to Title IV eligibility by becoming accredited" (or something like that). So, what if i don't want access Title IV funds? Can I be a good school without it? I think I can.

Keith Eric Grant wrote an insightful commentary on accreditation on his blog. The post was from May 3, 2008 and it is titled "Education, Training, and the Conundrum of Accreditation". I can't say it better than Keith (most people can't) and I think it it important that anyone proposing mandatory accreditation read that blog. At the end of his post, after he lists several links to reports questioning accreditation, he writes "Ultimately, the quality of a program that is oriented toward training rather than broad education derives from the stipulation of clear outcomes and assessment that they actually occur from training. At least at the present time, it appears that accreditation is far too diffuse a mechanism and in far too much flux of its own to further these goals is an efficient, cost effective manner." I agree.

There is a lot more than I could write on the costs of the process and how to absorb the costs a school would have to either increase prices or increase student counts, a whole slew of things, but it's late in the day and I think some of those items are covered in Keith's blog or some of his links.

I understand that having said all that I sound like I am anti-accreditation, which I am not. I would just like to be able to choose whether to be accredited or not, as opposed to have that regulation imposed on me.

E








Jason Erickson said:

As previously noted, there are a number of ways that graduates from unaccredited massage schools could pass the standards set out in the bill.

In the long run, shouldn't all schools be striving for accreditation? If not, why would that be considered acceptable?

Assuming that your own school provides a quality education, how do you feel about being lumped in with other schools that do not?

Other than accreditation, what would be a more equitable and reliable basic standard for massage schools? When formulating your answer, please realize that licensing bodies and employers need a very simple and easily verified standard for evaluating the quality of an applicant's scholastic training.

I don't know if there are any easy answers to these and other questions. I am interested to learn more about your perspective, so I hope you take the time to reply.

What accredited career schools have been accused of defrauding students? (Seriously, I have no idea - got links?)

The next legislative cycle is coming up in a few months. Let's resolve some differences and get some sane regulations passed in Minnesota!!!

Permalink Reply by Alexei Levine on September 11, 2010 at 6:38am

Bravo Emmanuel, well said! The kind of costs imposed on students and taxpayers by the accreditation process are immoral and unethical. There are also ethical conflicts of interest going on behind the scenes with accreditation commissioners running certification programs that compete with other, non-accredited schools. In at least one case that I'm aware of a commissioner of a massage accrediting corporation is also serving on a state massage board, writing regulations that suppress legitimate competition. People also forget that these accreditation agencies are private companies, not governmental agencies, that although non-profit, can pay outrageous salaries to the people who run them. According to Laura Allen the outgoing president of the AMTA made in the neighborhood of $300,000 yearly. This from an organization that depends on volunteers to do much of the work! Although the AMTA is not an accreditation agency, it is a non-profit, and suggestive of what might be going on at the accreditation agencies. It's starting to look an awful lot like a cartel is emerging in the Massage Therapy field.

Emmanuel Bistas said:

Jason,
I did not see your reply, I am sorry it took me so long to post. Starting with your last question about accredited schools defrauding students, I am talking about the Dept. of Education's proposed changes regarding gainful employment, default rates, etc. Information on the problem and proposed changes can be found here .
Unfortunately, the issue that DOE's proposals are trying to address have been referred to as a problem with "for profit" schools, rather than what it is, an issue with schools (for profit and non-for-profit) that take advantage of federal aid dollars (and student loans that are g...

Accreditation is the gatekeeper to Title IV funds, and the reason it is the gatekeeper is because of the notion that an independent body with standards related to processes, completion and placement rates, etc. will function as an objective school evaluator. Accredited schools are supposed to be good schools, right? Well, the current situation shows that at least in the case of several schools accreditation did not protect students, ensure program quality, etc.

I agree there should be standards, of course. But what standards are we talking about? education standards? retention standards? completion rates? and who should set those standards? ABHES? COMTA? ACCSCT? NCBTMB? State Boards? State Departments of Education? I hope that AFMTE will help with educational standards and that is why I took a good chunk of my very small budget and became a founding member of that organization when it got started. I think educational/curriculum standards should come from a body that focuses on education.

Should all schools strive for accreditation in the long run? When states can no longer regulate schools well, probably. But the accreditation process and associated costs would need to change for that to happen. What I did to ensure quality, was that in 2003 I hired an accreditation consultant to see what we are doing and made some changes based on his recommendations. Several times since then, I (or someone from my staff) has gone to COMTA accreditation workshops. But seriously, other than access to Title IV funds, what would accreditation give to the students? One of the brochures that I received by an accrediting organization last year said it like it is: it didn't say "take the first step to be a better school by becoming accredited", it said "take the first step to Title IV eligibility by becoming accredited" (or something like that). So, what if i don't want access Title IV funds? Can I be a good school without it? I think I can.

Keith Eric Grant wrote an insightful commentary on accreditation on his blog. The post was from May 3, 2008 and it is titled "Education, Training, and the Conundrum of Accreditation". I can't say it better than Keith (most people can't) and I think it it important that anyone proposing mandatory accreditation read that blog. At the end of his post, after he lists several links to reports questioning accreditation, he writes "Ultimately, the quality of a program that is oriented toward training rather than broad education derives from the stipulation of clear outcomes and assessment that they actually occur from training. At least at the present time, it appears that accreditation is far too diffuse a mechanism and in far too much flux of its own to further these goals is an efficient, cost effective manner." I agree.

There is a lot more than I could write on the costs of the process and how to absorb the costs a school would have to either increase prices or increase student counts, a whole slew of things, but it's late in the day and I think some of those items are covered in Keith's blog or some of his links.

I understand that having said all that I sound like I am anti-accreditation, which I am not. I would just like to be able to choose whether to be accredited or not, as opposed to have that regulation imposed on me.

E








Jason Erickson said:

As previously noted, there are a number of ways that graduates from unaccredited massage schools could pass the standards set out in the bill.

In the long run, shouldn't all schools be striving for accreditation? If not, why would that be considered acceptable? Assuming that your own school provides a quality education, how do you feel about being lumped in with other schools that do not? Other than accreditation, what would be a more equitable and reliable basic standard for massage schools? When formulating your answer, please realize that licensing bodies and employers need a very simple and easily verified standard for evaluating the quality of an applicant's scholastic training.

I don't know if there are any easy answers to these and other questions. I am interested to learn more about your perspective, so I hope you take the time to reply.

What accredited career schools have been accused of defrauding students? (Seriously, I have no idea - got links?)

The next legislative cycle is coming up in a few months. Let's resolve some differences and get some sane regulations passed in Minnesota!!!

Permalink Reply by Emmanuel Bistas on September 11, 2010 at 11:33am

Some more random thoughts on the topic....

Until few years ago, massage schools were small schools with the owner involved in the day-to-day operations. Classes were small and tuition was fairly low by today's standards. The school's reputation would bring in prospective students as much, or more so, than all the advertising in the world. The students would pay out of pocket, and would stick with the program for as long as 2 years in some cases (some programs were one day a week for 24 months). Sticking with the program and financing it yourself shows commitment to the massage field and to one's future as a massage therapist.

There were good and bad schools but the market forces would take care of things. Bad schools would not survive long because they would have no students. Even if in the short run they got some students, a better school would open up, take the business, and the bad school would eventually close. Barriers to entry in the massage education market were fairly low, so a bad school could not remain in a monopoly situation forever.

Then, things changed. By participating in accreditation and by increasing their number of hours, massage schools could now as many students they wanted. The number two obstacles preventing students from going to school - money and time- had been lifted. The government could pay part of the bill and would guarantee another part of the bill, and students did not even have to work anymore, they could get money for living expenses too. All they had to do was sign their name on a piece of paper. It did not take long until the big boys saw that and decided they wanted a piece of the action. So, we started having companies formed by investors who could care less about massage who started gobbling up little schools (nothing wrong with that, it's a free market, and many of the owners were getting older and tired).

So, what has happened since then? Massage schools tuition has skyrocketed. A Chicago-area school charged $9,000 for their program the year before they received financial aid, and $14,000 a year later. Who cares, when the extra 5,000 comes from the government anyway? The small classes of 6, 12, 18 students were replaced by as many as 54 in an area school. The costs of accreditation and the fact that students no longer paid out of pocket gave the incentive to schools to increase numbers. Accreditation, which was supposed to ensure quality, had some adverse effects, didn't it. Well, not accreditation itself, but the automatic eligibility for Title IV could create temptation even in the most honest school owner.

An adverse effect of the Title IV/accreditation debacle is that a lot of the smaller schools, the ones with the small classes, the individual attention started closing. They were asking students to reach in their pockets, while the other school down the street would ask their prospects to sign at the dotted line. They were asking students to pass tough exams, the school down the street would offer free tutoring so their students could graduate and they can meet their completion rates.

As a result, the small massage school has become an endangered species on its path to becoming extinct. One may say, why should I care? For the same reason that we care for other endangerment species. Because the future of all of us depends on having both big and small schools. Quality in education depends on competition and on giving consumers a choice. By introducing bills that limits choice to large schools (community colleges are also big schools) you are taking competition and choice away. You are introducing barriers to entry, because new schools will find it more difficult (or impossible) to enter.

If accreditation were not involved in Title IV, I would not be saying this. But in effect, by promoting accreditation you are pushing small businesses out of the market, you are introducing new costs and unnecessary regulation. I would be all for it, if accreditation somehow led to better therapists, but there is not a single study that I have seen that says that. I would also be all for it if somehow accreditation protected prospective students from going to bad schools, but it is evident that it has not (see proposed government rules)

The statement "accreditation=good" is no more than a belief system. That is obvious in your question "Assuming that your own school provides a quality education, how do you feel about being lumped in with other schools that do not?". Underlying your question is the belief that the "other schools that do not" (provide quality education, that is) are all non-accredited schools, which is not true. Am I making sense? It simply is not true that a non-accredited school is always worse than an accredited one. Sometimes that may be true, and sometimes it may be true that an accredited one will be worse that a non-accredited one. The focus should be on quality, not on accreditation. Quality should be based on metrics, not solely on accreditation.

Regarding the accreditation language in the Minessota bill, forgoing the support of the largest association in the country because of the "accreditation requirement" does not make sense to me. Wouldn't the public be better protected by a massage licensing law (that does not include the accreditation requirement) than having no law at all? If you answer no to this question, you are basically saying that 40+ states that do not require accreditation do not protect the public better than having any licensing law at all, which I do not think is the case.

No accreditation requirement would mean an environment of many schools, all offering their own advantages to consumers, where competition leads to higher quality in education and lower costs for the public. The alternative would be an environment that limits competition and favor fewer schools. You can always add accreditation at a later time when that becomes the norm in the massage therapy field.

Permalink Reply by Jason Erickson on September 13, 2010 at 1:04am

I am not convinced that non-accredited schools offer any better quality than accredited programs. I am sure that SOME did, but also that some did not. What was the true percentage? We will never know. Part of the advantage of accreditation is that we end up with some kind of measurable outcomes to work with. We can debate the advantages/disadvantages of that all day long, but at least it gives every school so accredited a common standard, or rather a minimum standard, to live by.

It is those schools who deliver above and beyond that will earn the superior reputations, particularly among employers. Interestingly, you will find that the employers who have higher standards will prefer grads from better schools. Employers with lower standards will often recruit aggressively from substandard schools because their grads will usually work for less. I see this happening every day in my area, and contacts all over the country report a similar pattern. So, it's unlikely that the accreditation requirement will make any real substantive changes in MN, as most/all of the current massage programs here are accredited already.

Those that want to provide quality massage education without being accredited as a school should perhaps change their business model to focus on providing affordable, high-quality continuing education or other massage/bodywork-related services.

For now, ABMP is simply taking a stance on behalf of their member schools. It's an obvious move for clear rea$on$, but as an insurance provider you can bet your hiney that they'd prefer to see all schools accredited. Further, once a law is passed, it is MUCH harder to amend it. If the long-term goal is accreditation of all massage schools, putting it in the law right away will greatly speed that process along.

Ultimately, I think this particular issue is overblown. Massage therapy is still a poorly-organized profession that has no uniform teacher-training standards or requirements, a still-controversial MTBOK that most practitioners are not familiar with, and a decided lack of research literacy and critical thinking skills. School accreditation (or not) is a minor detail when we have teachers that don't know how to teach, no group consensus on what it is that we should know before entering the profession, and little understanding of how to find/read/evaluate scientific/non-scientific claims related to our profession.

In Minnesota, ABMP's lack of support is nearly meaningless, as they never provided any material or financial support to help the drive for licensure. They also never provided any support to the opposition... they are essentially just waiting to see what happens while everyone else takes a stand one way or the other. The current effort is for a VOLUNTARY credential, which means anyone not pursuing it won't be impacted if it passes.

Emmanuel Bistas said:

Some more random thoughts on the topic....

Until few years ago, massage schools were small schools with the owner involved in the day-to-day operations. Classes were small and tuition was fairly low by today's standards. The school's reputation would bring in prospective students as much, or more so, than all the advertising in the world. The students would pay out of pocket, and would stick with the program for as long as 2 years in some cases (some programs were one day a week for 24 months). Sticking with the program and financing it yourself shows commitment to the massage field and to one's future as a massage therapist.

There were good and bad schools but the market forces would take care of things. Bad schools would not survive long because they would have no students. Even if in the short run they got some students, a better school would open up, take the business, and the bad school would eventually close. Barriers to entry in the massage education market were fairly low, so a bad school could not remain in a monopoly situation forever.

Then, things changed. By participating in accreditation and by increasing their number of hours, massage schools could now as many students they wanted. The number two obstacles preventing students from going to school - money and time- had been lifted. The government could pay part of the bill and would guarantee another part of the bill, and students did not even have to work anymore, they could get money for living expenses too. All they had to do was sign their name on a piece of paper. It did not take long until the big boys saw that and decided they wanted a piece of the action. So, we started having companies formed by investors who could care less about massage who started gobbling up little schools (nothing wrong with that, it's a free market, and many of the owners were getting older and tired).

So, what has happened since then? Massage schools tuition has skyrocketed. A Chicago-area school charged $9,000 for their program the year before they received financial aid, and $14,000 a year later. Who cares, when the extra 5,000 comes from the government anyway? The small classes of 6, 12, 18 students were replaced by as many as 54 in an area school. The costs of accreditation and the fact that students no longer paid out of pocket gave the incentive to schools to increase numbers. Accreditation, which was supposed to ensure quality, had some adverse effects, didn't it. Well, not accreditation itself, but the automatic eligibility for Title IV could create temptation even in the most honest school owner.

An adverse effect of the Title IV/accreditation debacle is that a lot of the smaller schools, the ones with the small classes, the individual attention started closing. They were asking students to reach in their pockets, while the other school down the street would ask their prospects to sign at the dotted line. They were asking students to pass tough exams, the school down the street would offer free tutoring so their students could graduate and they can meet their completion rates.

As a result, the small massage school has become an endangered species on its path to becoming extinct. One may say, why should I care? For the same reason that we care for other endangerment species. Because the future of all of us depends on having both big and small schools. Quality in education depends on competition and on giving consumers a choice. By introducing bills that limits choice to large schools (community colleges are also big schools) you are taking competition and choice away. You are introducing barriers to entry, because new schools will find it more difficult (or impossible) to enter.

If accreditation were not involved in Title IV, I would not be saying this. But in effect, by promoting accreditation you are pushing small businesses out of the market, you are introducing new costs and unnecessary regulation. I would be all for it, if accreditation somehow led to better therapists, but there is not a single study that I have seen that says that. I would also be all for it if somehow accreditation protected prospective students from going to bad schools, but it is evident that it has not (see proposed government rules)

The statement "accreditation=good" is no more than a belief system. That is obvious in your question "Assuming that your own school provides a quality education, how do you feel about being lumped in with other schools that do not?". Underlying your question is the belief that the "other schools that do not" (provide quality education, that is) are all non-accredited schools, which is not true. Am I making sense? It simply is not true that a non-accredited school is always worse than an accredited one. Sometimes that may be true, and sometimes it may be true that an accredited one will be worse that a non-accredited one. The focus should be on quality, not on accreditation. Quality should be based on metrics, not solely on accreditation.

Regarding the accreditation language in the Minessota bill, forgoing the support of the largest association in the country because of the "accreditation requirement" does not make sense to me. Wouldn't the public be better protected by a massage licensing law (that does not include the accreditation requirement) than having no law at all? If you answer no to this question, you are basically saying that 40+ states that do not require accreditation do not protect the public better than having any licensing law at all, which I do not think is the case.

No accreditation requirement would mean an environment of many schools, all offering their own advantages to consumers, where competition leads to higher quality in education and lower costs for the public. The alternative would be an environment that limits competition and favor fewer schools. You can always add accreditation at a later time when that becomes the norm in the massage therapy field.

Permalink Reply by Alexei Levine on September 13, 2010 at 7:14am

As an unaccredited school we can charge our students ten thousand dollars less than accredited career schools in our region. That is an incredible public service. We have made a real difference in our students and their clients lives without saddling them with crippling debt. Accreditation seems to be a way for big corporations to rip off their students and the taxpayers whose money is lost when those loans are defaulted on. There is no evidence that accreditation leads to quality, however if you follow the news about corrupt practices and predatory recruitment at career schools it becomes apparent that the huge amounts of tuition money involved at accredited schools is an irresistible payoff for bad actors. The current crackdown on career schools at the federal level is inspired by problems with predatory recruiting at accredited schools, not the small unaccredited schools which charge much less, deliver higher quality, and don't depend on government funding..

Permalink Reply by Emmanuel Bistas on September 13, 2010 at 11:17am

Dear Jason,

Nobody is saying that an non-accredited school is better than an accredited one. Not sure why you thought that. Of course some are and some aren't. What I am saying is that an accredited school is not necessarily better than a non-accredited one. Some are, and some aren't. Do you agree with this statement?

I understand about the metrics, but which metrics? For example, if we take two schools - on accredited through ACCST and one accredited by COMTA, do we have the same metrics?

You said that "it is those schools that deliver above and beyond that will earn the superior reputations". I agree with that statement, but what is above and beyond? It sounds like you are asking the assumption that "above and beyond" means "accredited", right? So, if accreditation is proof of above and beyond, what about those schools that were cited in the government reports as lying to prospective students, and which were accredited, are those above and beyond?

Again, nobody is saying that schools should not be accredited. All we are saying, don't require that everyone is accredited.

I don't think we will convince each other here, and that is not even why I am writing this. I just hope that those who read these posts and who are a bit more objective in their thinking can hear both sides of the story.

As far as ABMP goes, I can't speak for them. They explained why they are not supporting the accreditation component and I posted it here. As a small school owner, I am grateful because they represent me well. I cannot always say that about AMTA.


Jason Erickson said:

I am not convinced that non-accredited schools offer any better quality than accredited programs. I am sure that SOME did, but also that some did not. What was the true percentage? We will never know. Part of the advantage of accreditation is that we end up with some kind of measurable outcomes to work with. We can debate the advantages/disadvantages of that all day long, but at least it gives every school so accredited a common standard, or rather a minimum standard, to live by.

It is those schools who deliver above and beyond that will earn the superior reputations, particularly among employers. Interestingly, you will find that the employers who have higher standards will prefer grads from better schools. Employers with lower standards will often recruit aggressively from substandard schools because their grads will usually work for less. I see this happening every day in my area, and contacts all over the country report a similar pattern. So, it's unlikely that the accreditation requirement will make any real substantive changes in MN, as most/all of the current massage programs here are accredited already.

Those that want to provide quality massage education without being accredited as a school should perhaps change their business model to focus on providing affordable, high-quality continuing education or other massage/bodywork-related services.

For now, ABMP is simply taking a stance on behalf of their member schools. It's an obvious move for clear rea$on$, but as an insurance provider you can bet your hiney that they'd prefer to see all schools accredited. Further, once a law is passed, it is MUCH harder to amend it. If the long-term goal is accreditation of all massage schools, putting it in the law right away will greatly speed that process along.

Ultimately, I think this particular issue is overblown. Massage therapy is still a poorly-organized profession that has no uniform teacher-training standards or requirements, a still-controversial MTBOK that most practitioners are not familiar with, and a decided lack of research literacy and critical thinking skills. School accreditation (or not) is a minor detail when we have teachers that don't know how to teach, no group consensus on what it is that we should know before entering the profession, and little understanding of how to find/read/evaluate scientific/non-scientific claims related to our profession.

In Minnesota, ABMP's lack of support is nearly meaningless, as they never provided any material or financial support to help the drive for licensure. They also never provided any support to the opposition... they are essentially just waiting to see what happens while everyone else takes a stand one way or the other. The current effort is for a VOLUNTARY credential, which means anyone not pursuing it won't be impacted if it passes.

Emmanuel Bistas said:

Some more random thoughts on the topic....

Until few years ago, massage schools were small schools with the owner involved in the day-to-day operations. Classes were small and tuition was fairly low by today's standards. The school's reputation would bring in prospective students as much, or more so, than all the advertising in the world. The students would pay out of pocket, and would stick with the program for as long as 2 years in some cases (some programs were one day a week for 24 months). Sticking with the program and financing it yourself shows commitment to the massage field and to one's future as a massage therapist.

There were good and bad schools but the market forces would take care of things. Bad schools would not survive long because they would have no students. Even if in the short run they got some students, a better school would open up, take the business, and the bad school would eventually close. Barriers to entry in the massage education market were fairly low, so a bad school could not remain in a monopoly situation forever.

Then, things changed. By participating in accreditation and by increasing their number of hours, massage schools could now as many students they wanted. The number two obstacles preventing students from going to school - money and time- had been lifted. The government could pay part of the bill and would guarantee another part of the bill, and students did not even have to work anymore, they could get money for living expenses too. All they had to do was sign their name on a piece of paper. It did not take long until the big boys saw that and decided they wanted a piece of the action. So, we started having companies formed by investors who could care less about massage who started gobbling up little schools (nothing wrong with that, it's a free market, and many of the owners were getting older and tired).

So, what has happened since then? Massage schools tuition has skyrocketed. A Chicago-area school charged $9,000 for their program the year before they received financial aid, and $14,000 a year later. Who cares, when the extra 5,000 comes from the government anyway? The small classes of 6, 12, 18 students were replaced by as many as 54 in an area school. The costs of accreditation and the fact that students no longer paid out of pocket gave the incentive to schools to increase numbers. Accreditation, which was supposed to ensure quality, had some adverse effects, didn't it. Well, not accreditation itself, but the automatic eligibility for Title IV could create temptation even in the most honest school owner.

An adverse effect of the Title IV/accreditation debacle is that a lot of the smaller schools, the ones with the small classes, the individual attention started closing. They were asking students to reach in their pockets, while the other school down the street would ask their prospects to sign at the dotted line. They were asking students to pass tough exams, the school down the street would offer free tutoring so their students could graduate and they can meet their completion rates.

As a result, the small massage school has become an endangered species on its path to becoming extinct. One may say, why should I care? For the same reason that we care for other endangerment species. Because the future of all of us depends on having both big and small schools. Quality in education depends on competition and on giving consumers a choice. By introducing bills that limits choice to large schools (community colleges are also big schools) you are taking competition and choice away. You are introducing barriers to entry, because new schools will find it more difficult (or impossible) to enter.

If accreditation were not involved in Title IV, I would not be saying this. But in effect, by promoting accreditation you are pushing small businesses out of the market, you are introducing new costs and unnecessary regulation. I would be all for it, if accreditation somehow led to better therapists, but there is not a single study that I have seen that says that. I would also be all for it if somehow accreditation protected prospective students from going to bad schools, but it is evident that it has not (see proposed government rules)

The statement "accreditation=good" is no more than a belief system. That is obvious in your question "Assuming that your own school provides a quality education, how do you feel about being lumped in with other schools that do not?". Underlying your question is the belief that the "other schools that do not" (provide quality education, that is) are all non-accredited schools, which is not true. Am I making sense? It simply is not true that a non-accredited school is always worse than an accredited one. Sometimes that may be true, and sometimes it may be true that an accredited one will be worse that a non-accredited one. The focus should be on quality, not on accreditation. Quality should be based on metrics, not solely on accreditation.

Regarding the accreditation language in the Minessota bill, forgoing the support of the largest association in the country because of the "accreditation requirement" does not make sense to me. Wouldn't the public be better protected by a massage licensing law (that does not include the accreditation requirement) than having no law at all? If you answer no to this question, you are basically saying that 40+ states that do not require accreditation do not protect the public better than having any licensing law at all, which I do not think is the case.

No accreditation requirement would mean an environment of many schools, all offering their own advantages to consumers, where competition leads to higher quality in education and lower costs for the public. The alternative would be an environment that limits competition and favor fewer schools. You can always add accreditation at a later time when that becomes the norm in the massage therapy field.

Permalink Reply by Jason Erickson on September 13, 2010 at 11:24pm

Emmanuel - Yes, you and I understand each other fairly well. :) You made good points, but we have different perspectives and that's okay. I would prefer to see accredited schools held to a higher standard of graduate competence, as some are just in it for money while others are truly exceptional. I love this profession and work hard to promote a higher standard of excellence and a passion for ongoing learning.

I hope that some day we find the profession in a position that we both can be fully happy with.

Permalink Reply by Kevin Clark on October 15, 2010 at 8:01am

I'm curious:

Why voluntary registration instead of mandatory licensing?

Why the Nursing Board?

Thanks!

Permalink Reply by Jason Erickson on October 17, 2010 at 11:01am

Kevin Clark said:

I'm curious:

Why voluntary registration instead of mandatory licensing?

Why the Nursing Board?

Thanks!

Voluntary registration represents a compromise with those who would prefer no statewide credential. However, support for mandatory licensing is strong, so we will have to see what the next legislative cycle brings.

A poll of Minnesota massage therapists showed that, by far, the Nursing Board was the top choice for which existing board might oversee a Massage Therapy Board. Having an existing board provide oversight greatly simplifies the establishment of a new MT board.

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