Columbia Pacific University

Frequently Asked Questions


1. What are the origins of Columbia Pacific University?

Columbia Pacific University was founded in 1978 by two longtime university administrators and a Harvard educated psychiatrist. For 20 years CPU was based in its own building in San Rafael, California. CPU was a pioneer in distance education and delivered programs, employing a wholistic emphasis, to accomplished adults.

2. What was valuable about Columbia Pacific University for its students?

The answer to that question is provided by alumni, most of which also hold graduate degrees from traditional accredited institutions. CPU students embraced the CPU vision of integration, health and lifelong learning. To them CPU represented a pioneering vision and the possibility of a break with the pitfalls of tradition. The majority experienced CPU as consumer centered, for example providing opportunity to pursue interdisciplinary studies without soul-crushing politics.

An example is provided by Dr. Rodney Chang, who had several regionally accredited graduate degrees AND a PhD from The Union Institute before coming to CPU to do an independent study on art (here is the link). In essence CPU was the community of students and alumni connecting with the CPU vision, being supported individually and working from there as a base of values. 

3. Does Columbia Pacific University still exist?

CPU exists as an alumni community. Alumni have been organizing since CPU closed its doors in 2000. In 2004 an Alumni Board of Governors was elected to oversee CPU's interests. The Board acquired at no cost the remaining assets of CPU (the logo, records, etc.) and incorporated CPU as a non profit corporation in the State of Delaware. CPU is currently in application for federal non-profit status.

4. Are Columbia Pacific University degrees legal?

99.5 % of the degrees conferred by CPU (from 1978 to 1997) are recognized by the state of California as legal and valid. The state uses the term "approved" and signifies the majority of those degrees as "consistent in quality" with degrees conferred by appropriately accredited institutions. The other one-half of 1% (33 degrees) were conferred after 1997 when CPU's then owners followed their attorney's advice and remained open while their appeals wound their way through state court. Our position is that this was a mistake on their part.

5. Is Columbia Pacific University currently offering degrees?

No. CPU is not offering degree programs at this time. CPU is currently focused on its alumni development and its own organization development. 

About 7500. Our electronic records, going back to 1991, show 2082 graduates since 1991. Thirty-three of those graduated after June 21, 1997. The majority of CPU graduates between 1991 and 2000 were from the USA (1734). Also during that period there were 107 graduates from Canada and 241 graduates from a variety of other countries. There are several thousand other graduate records in our non-electronic files.

7. What are Columbia Pacific University's plans?

At the moment CPU is an alumni-focused nonprofit corporation that is centered on alumni development and our own organization development. CPU was formerly the largest distance learning institution in North America and a pioneer in adult alternative education. We are currently engaged in strategic planning, and in short we plan to undergo a self-study using appreciative inquiry. Graduate coursework including theses and dissertations were lost after the closure of CPU. Currently we are collecting copies of same to build an archive. The CPU Press has also been re-established and will soon release its first publication.   

8. Columbia Pacific University was originally private and for profit: Are CPU’s owners still involved?

No. As mentioned, CPU is state incorporated as a nonprofit and is seeking federal nonprofit status. CPU’s former owners no longer hold an interest or influence in CPU. The Alumni Board of Governors now envisions CPU as a lifelong learning community with 7500 graduates/members. 

9. Was Columbia Pacific University a degree mill?

No. CPU was the first California Approved Institution to gain Full Institutional Approval in 1986. CPU was founded in 1978. CPU’s then president Richard Crews, MD (Harvard U.), served on the committee that recommended the improved private postsecondary education quality act of 1985 in California. CPU’s programs were classified by the State Department of Education as “consistent in quality” with regionally accredited institutions. Many of CPU’s graduates figure prominently in a who’s who of success in North America and around the world. To imply that CPU was a degree mill is to imply that the State was itself fraudulent in declaring CPU to be "consistent in quality" with accredited institutions.

10. Was Columbia Pacific University ever regionally accredited?

CPU was not regionally accredited but enjoyed “Full Institutional  Approval” in California, which was a special category and which referred to CPU’s programs as being “consistent in quality” with the programs of properly accredited institutions in the USA. Full Institutional Approval was also required as a precursor to requesting regional accreditation from the Western Association of Schools and Colleges. Most people, including many politicians and journalists, don't fully understand the concept of accreditation and need to be educated on its meaning. Accreditation has different meanings in different countries.

The California private postsecondary education act of 1989 was brought in, in part, by a lobby from independent accredited institutions who were concerned that state approved private institutions were taking too much of their business. We have inferred this in part from comments by Spille and Stewart (1988: see Diploma Mills: Degrees of Fraud). The 1989 Act only allowed traditional curricula and disallowed anything innovative. In effect, the 1989 act created a hierarchy of learning and eradicated innovation. The 1989 act constructed approved institutions as 'less than', from then on describing them as to "meet minimum standards". Under pressure the State turned its back on innovation, giving the rights to innovation to accredited schools only. For an interesting argument on perception and this two-tiered system see (article link provided shortly).

According to the visiting committee which refused CPU’s request for re-approval, CPU was unable to meet the new regulations. An independent consultant reviewed the findings and found  “88 errors of fact” by the committee. CPU failed one re-approval visit but passed other re-approval visits for almost 20 years. Schools also lose their accreditation from time to time or end up "on notice" or on probation. CPU was given no such opportunity to correct its failings.

In one error the committee stated that two Africans serving as Deans at CPU were unqualified to be Deans because they had graduated from unaccredited schools. In fact their PhD’s were from established and respected European universities (University of Wales and the University of Bremen). CPU appealed the committee’s decision. In 1997 the administrative judge hearing the case refused to give CPU’s president time to find an attorney. The president, Richard Crews, MD, had to act as CPU’s attorney, and lost in court. CPU was ordered to close as of June 21, 1997. A high level state official turned whistleblower and later testified in court that she was told that the state agency (now California’s BBPVE) had planned to close down CPU. She testified that this conspiracy was in the works going back to 1992.

Facts about Columbia Pacific University have been twisted out of context by  some self-serving website owners who are trying to increase their website traffic. Other detractors have included media who do not do their homework and appear to prefer yellow journalism than real full reporting; they include the San Diego Union Tribune, AOL, and USA Today. There seems to have been so many lies, distortions, etc. spread by these interests about CPU that only an idiot would believe it all.

These "reporters" and website owners often select only facts and rhetoric that meet their own agenda. They often regurgitate each others ill-formed stories, making themselves the news. As communications guru Marshall McLuhan stated 'the medium is often the message'. Some of their accusations are in fact false and libelous to CPU alumni. CPU was a good alternative institution which after twenty years of operation, failed to change with newly implemented and constraining state regulations. Acting upon legal advice that differed with the State’s position, the owners chose to keep CPU open after 1997. Another court ruled in 1998 that CPU was acting illegally by remaining open. CPU appealed that ruling, continued to remain open, and lost the appeal in 2000.

The Alumni Board of Governors of CPU have passed as resolution our position that staying open after 1997 was a mistake made by CPU’s owners as a private institution. We assert that if this Board of Alumni Governors existed back then, CPU's programs would have been thriving today; CPU would have been reorganized as nonprofit, and would have gained accreditation. However, considering the dire circumstances of the time, we understand the owners’ decision to follow the legal advice they received. After the closure, students were contacted with teach-out options.

14. What is the position of Columbia Pacific University on work done for a degree?

CPU's Board of Governors asserts that work done for a degree should be reflect the existing standards of rigor set by regionally accredited institutions. We are currently collecting and archiving CPU dissertations and doing a study of content, comparing same with dissertations of regionally accredited institutions. We will make our findings and method public.