Assistant Secretary of Education Ochoa Resigns

Removed Key Requirement for CCE to Demonstrate Widespread Acceptance

Dr. Eduardo M. Ochoa, U.S. assistant secretary for post-secondary education in President Obama’s Department of Education has resigned and will step in as interim president of California State University Monterey Bay.

Ochoa pulled the rug out from under the conservative faction of the chiropractic in a letter dated March 15, 2012 to the Council on Chiropractic Education. In December 2011 the National Advisory Committee on Institutional Quality and Integrity (NACIQI) had found the CCE to be in violation of 43 Federal Recognition Criteria including a violation of 34 C.F.R. 602.13 dealing with the wide acceptance of the agency’s standards, policies, procedures and decisions and to told them to address how the agency’s standards advance quality in chiropractic education.

In a shocking move the Assistant Secretary had told the CCE:

"I disagree with NACIQI’s concern about lack of wide acceptance of the agency’s standards in the field. The dissenting voices in my judgment are a small minority within the profession. Generally, I agree with the arguments presented by the agency in this regard. Accordingly, I am not requiring that CCE address 34 C.F.R. 602.13, or how the agency’s standards advance quality in chiropractic education, in its compliance report.”

Ochoa was due to begin his new job at CSUMB on July 16. It is not expected that a new Assistant Secretary will be named until after the November elections.