Chiropractic Accreditation: What the CCE Is, and How to Check Any Program

What the Council on Chiropractic Education is

The Council on Chiropractic Education, usually shortened to CCE, is the agency that accredits Doctor of Chiropractic programs in the United States. The U.S. Department of Education recognizes it for exactly that. The Department’s own register, the Database of Accredited Postsecondary Institutions and Programs (DAPIP), lists the agency as “Council on Chiropractic Education, Commission on Accreditation” and states its scope of recognition as “the accreditation of programs leading to the Doctor of Chiropractic degree and single-purpose institutions offering the Doctor of Chiropractic program.” The same entry gives 1974 as the year the Department first recognized the agency and 2019 as the most recent recognition. Read from DAPIP on October 12, 2026.

CCE describes itself the same way. Its accreditation-actions announcement of August 4, 2026 opens: “The Council on Chiropractic Education (CCE) is the agency recognized by the U.S. Department of Education (USDE) and the Council for Higher Education Accreditation (CHEA) for the accreditation of Doctor of Chiropractic degree programs.”

The Department itself accredits nothing. It recognizes accrediting agencies and publishes what each one is recognized to accredit. That distinction matters when you are reading a school’s admissions page: a program is accredited by the CCE, never by the Department of Education.

What accreditation means — and what it does not

Accreditation means the program has been measured against the CCE Accreditation Standards by a peer review team and the Council, and that the Council has decided to award or continue its accreditation. For each action the Council publishes the decision, the bases and reasons for it, the standards sections involved, and the dates of the next reporting and site visit. You can read all of that for any program.

It does not mean the programs are equivalent. Accreditation is a floor, not a ladder. Two accredited programs can differ widely on cost, calendar, licensing-exam performance, clinical model, campus culture and what graduates earn — which is to say, on nearly everything you would actually choose between them by. Neither the CCE directory nor DAPIP orders programs or scores them. If you want figures you can order by, the median federal debt at completion and median earnings four years out are published program by program on the findings page.

It also does not mean a clean record. The Council can attach a sanction while accreditation continues, and its wording for the probation action is “Continued with sanction of probation”. A program on probation is still an accredited program.

How to check any program yourself

Two registers settle it, and neither is a school’s own website. Use both: the CCE directory for the accreditation action and its reasons, DAPIP for the Department-side record.

1. The CCE’s own directory. Accredited Doctor of Chiropractic Programs at cce-usa.org lists every program currently holding accredited status, with its website and its locations. Clicking a program name opens its most recent accreditation activity and status, the bases and reasons the status was awarded, any conditions imposed, the dates of the next accreditation activities, and a link to that program’s completion rates and licensing board success rates.
2. The Department of Education’s DAPIP. ope.ed.gov/dapip lets you search an institution by name and see which recognized agency accredits it, along with the institution’s campuses and additional locations. Search the institution, not the program name, and look for the Council on Chiropractic Education in its accreditation record.

Of the two, CCE’s directory is the live list: it is what the Council maintains, and it is where an accreditation action shows up first. DAPIP carries the Department-side record of which recognized agency accredits an institution, and its location records are not always current — when we read it on October 12, 2026 it still held CCE-accredited location records for Palmer’s San Jose, California campus and Cleveland’s Los Angeles campus, neither of which appears in CCE’s directory. A program that is in the application process is not accredited, however the wording on its own site reads. If a claim on a school’s page and the registers disagree, the registers are what to act on.

CCE-accredited chiropractic schools

These are the programs CCE’s directory listed as currently holding accredited status when we read it on October 12, 2026 — 19 programs at 23 locations as the directory lists them, with the locations written as CCE writes them. (CCE states 21 program locations in its own summary material while its directory lists 23 campus sites; the schools index notes that we have not resolved which figure is current, and the count here is the directory’s.) Eighteen are in the United States and Puerto Rico; one is in Canada. The ChiroTrack state page for each one is linked beside it.

• Campbellsville UniversityCampbellsville, KY — the university publishes its School of Chiropractic as “located at our Harrodsburg campus” (campbellsville.edu, read October 12, 2026)Kentucky
• Canadian Memorial Chiropractic CollegeToronto, ON, CanadaNo ChiroTrack state page — the program is in Canada
• Cleveland University – Kansas CityOverland Park, KansasKansas
• D’Youville UniversityBuffalo, New YorkNew York
• Keiser UniversityWest Palm Beach, FloridaFlorida
• Life Chiropractic College WestHayward, California (main campus); Bellevue, Nebraska (additional educational site)California
• Life UniversityMarietta, GeorgiaGeorgia
• Logan UniversityChesterfield, MissouriMissouri
• National UniversityLombard, Illinois (main campus); Pinellas Park, Florida (additional educational site) — the university publishes its name as National University of Health Sciences (nuhs.edu, read October 12, 2026)Illinois · Florida
• Northeast College of Health SciencesSeneca Falls, New York (main campus); Levittown, New York (additional educational site)New York
• Northwestern Health Sciences UniversityBloomington, MinnesotaMinnesota
• Palmer College of ChiropracticDavenport, Iowa (main campus); Port Orange, Florida (branch campus)Iowa · Florida
• Parker UniversityDallas, TexasTexas
• Sherman College of ChiropracticSpartanburg, South CarolinaSouth Carolina
• Southern California University of Health SciencesWhittier, CaliforniaCalifornia
• Texas Chiropractic CollegePasadena, TexasTexas
• Universidad Central del CaribeBayamon, Puerto RicoPuerto Rico
• University of BridgeportBridgeport, ConnecticutConnecticut
• University of Western StatesPortland, OregonOregon

Order is alphabetical, as in the CCE directory. Nothing here is ranked. For what each program publishes about itself — calendars, campuses, cost and board performance — see the schools index and the state pages.

Programs under a CCE sanction

Accreditation continues while a sanction is in force, so a program on this list is an accredited program with findings against it. These are the actions as CCE published them; we read the announcements on October 12, 2026.

Keiser University College of Chiropractic Medicine (West Palm Beach, Florida). Action: “Continued with sanction of probation”, taken at the Council’s January 2026 meeting and announced on February 13, 2026, for one area of noncompliance. CCE gives the reason as the program’s four-year weighted average licensing exam success rate of 73 percent, below the 80 percent threshold set by CCE Policy 56.

Life Chiropractic College West (Hayward, California). Action: “Continued with sanction of probation”, taken at the Council’s July 2026 meeting and announced on August 4, 2026, for what the announcement states as eight (8) areas of noncompliance, in the standards sections it cites: 2.B.2 integrity; 2.G.1 student admissions; 2.H curriculum, competencies and outcomes assessment; 2.H.1 curricular content and delivery; 2.H.2 assessment of learning outcomes and curricular effectiveness; and 2.H.3 quality patient care. The Council requires further reporting and a focused site visit in spring 2027.

Life University (Marietta, Georgia) is not under a sanction. The Council continued its accreditation and removed its probation at the January 2026 meeting, announced February 13, 2026.

Two programs carry an identified area of weakness, which is not a sanction: Campbellsville University and Parker University, both in student achievement, both required to file a progress report. CCE announced the Campbellsville and Parker actions on August 4, 2026.

CCE publishes accreditation actions twice a year, after the Council’s January and July meetings, and its Accreditation Standards (July 2026) say that “any of the above actions may be applied in any order, at any time” — so a sanction can also appear between those announcements, as the Council’s May 6, 2024 probation notice did. Before you rely on any of this, read the current list yourself: CCE publishes each announcement on its news page, and the August 4, 2026 announcement and the February 13, 2026 announcement are the two that produced the actions above.

Programs seeking accreditation

CCE publishes a separate list of programs whose application it has accepted. On October 12, 2026 that list held one Doctor of Chiropractic degree program: the University of Pittsburgh, in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. CCE describes the stage as the start of the initial accreditation process — an application with a letter of intent and evidence of eligibility, after which, in CCE’s words, “the Council determines if further documentation is required or establishes timelines for the program regarding the self-study report, peer review site visit, and status review meeting.”

An accepted application is not accreditation, and a program at this stage holds no accredited status. The current list is on CCE’s Accepted Applicants page. What this means for students in that state is on the Pennsylvania page.

Accreditation outside the United States

Chiropractic accreditation is regional. The Councils on Chiropractic Education International (CCEI) is the body those regional agencies belong to, and it is explicit about its own limits: “CCEI does not accredit individual programs or institutions.”

CCEI’s own Accrediting Bodies page listed three member agencies in good standing when we read it on October 12, 2026:

• Council on Chiropractic Education Australasia (CCEA) — programs in Australia, New Zealand and Malaysia.
• European Council on Chiropractic Education (ECCE) — programs in the United Kingdom, Spain, France, Denmark, Switzerland and South Africa.
• Council on Chiropractic Education Canada (CCEC) — the two Canadian programs, in Toronto and Trois-Rivières.

It also lists one associate member, the Councils on Chiropractic Education Latin America. The United States CCE is not listed on that page. If you are considering a program abroad and intend to practice in a particular country, check that country’s licensing board as well as the program’s accreditor — the two are separate bodies with separate rules.

Where accreditation sits in the rest of the decision

Accreditation tells you a program cleared the floor. It tells you nothing about whether it is the right program for you. Once you have confirmed status in the registers, the questions that are left are the ones the schools index is built for: calendar, location, clinical model and culture. Before any of that, if you have not yet spent hours inside a practice, start there. And if you are working out whether you can get in at all, the accreditor’s admission standard and each program’s own list are on the prerequisites page.

FAQ

Are chiropractic schools accredited?

Yes. In the United States, Doctor of Chiropractic programs are accredited by the Council on Chiropractic Education, and the U.S. Department of Education recognizes the CCE for that purpose. CCE's own directory listed 19 accredited programs when we read it on October 12, 2026. A school can be accredited and still be under a CCE sanction, because accreditation continues while a sanction is in force.

What is the Council on Chiropractic Education?

The CCE is the agency that accredits programs leading to the Doctor of Chiropractic degree in the United States. The Department of Education's own register, DAPIP, lists it as “Council on Chiropractic Education, Commission on Accreditation” and gives its scope of recognition as “the accreditation of programs leading to the Doctor of Chiropractic degree and single-purpose institutions offering the Doctor of Chiropractic program.” The same entry gives 1974 as the year the Department first recognized it and 2019 as the most recent.

Does the U.S. Department of Education accredit chiropractic schools?

No. The Department does not accredit anything. It recognizes accrediting agencies and lists them, with the programs and institutions they accredit, in the Database of Accredited Postsecondary Institutions and Programs, DAPIP. You can use DAPIP to confirm which recognized agency accredits a given institution.

How do I check whether a chiropractic program is accredited?

Use the two public registers rather than the school's own marketing. First, the CCE's directory of accredited Doctor of Chiropractic programs at cce-usa.org, where each program name opens its most recent accreditation action, the bases and reasons for it, and the next review dates. Second, DAPIP at ope.ed.gov/dapip, where you can search the institution and see which recognized agency accredits it.

Is a chiropractic school on probation still accredited?

Yes. The Council's own wording for the action is “Continued with sanction of probation”: the accreditation continues and the sanction sits on top of it. Probation means CCE found areas of noncompliance and requires further reporting, and it publishes which standards are involved.

Which chiropractic programs are under a CCE sanction right now?

As CCE published them: Keiser University College of Chiropractic Medicine, continued with sanction of probation at the January 2026 meeting, announced February 13, 2026, for one area of noncompliance; and Life Chiropractic College West, continued with sanction of probation at the July 2026 meeting, announced August 4, 2026, for eight areas of noncompliance. Life University's probation was removed at the January 2026 meeting. Read from CCE's announcements on October 12, 2026; check the CCE news page for anything published since.

Is there an accreditation-based ranking of chiropractic schools?

No. Neither the CCE nor the Department of Education ranks Doctor of Chiropractic programs. Accreditation is a threshold a program meets or does not meet, and the registers publish status, not order. Any ranked list of chiropractic schools you find was built by a commercial publisher using weightings it chose.

Which agencies accredit chiropractic programs outside the United States?

The Councils on Chiropractic Education International lists three member agencies in good standing on its own Accrediting Bodies page: the Council on Chiropractic Education Australasia, the European Council on Chiropractic Education, and the Council on Chiropractic Education Canada. It also lists one associate member, the Councils on Chiropractic Education Latin America. CCEI states that it does not accredit individual programs or institutions itself. Read October 12, 2026.

Something here out of date or wrong? Tell us and we will fix it in public: corrections.