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automatically certified upon the law's passage, and new ones would have to apply.
• Governor's spokesman Tony Venhuizen said the University of Northern Virginia received certification based on the paperwork it submitted, but questions have been raised about whether its affiliate agreement covered all of its programs. A complaint came in to the South Dakota Attorney General's office, which is investigating.
• Venhuizen said rather than duplicating regulatory efforts, South Dakota has always taken a less heavy-handed approach with private institutions and has relied on the existing accreditation process.
• "Any system you set up depends on the validity of the records are filed," he said.
• The University of Northern Virginia had operated in Annandale, Va., for about 15 years, once serving more than 1,000 students who were mostly from India. But U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials raided the offices in 2011 amid allegations that the school's primary function was to allow those enrolled to obtain a visa.
• Virginia officials shut down the school in July 2013 after discovering it failed for the last five years to receive accreditation from any organization recognized by the U.S. Department of Education. ICE followed up in October by withdrawing the school's approval for attendance of nonimmigrant students. No charges have been filed.
• Rather than shut its doors completely, the school headed west.
• School officials sent an application to the South Dakota Secretary of State's office on Oct. 15, and three days later the office certified the unaccredited school to provide postsecondary education in the state.
• The South Dakota Board of Regents, which governs the state's public higher education system, has no authority over private nonprofit and for-profit universities. A South Dakota statute that applies to anyone offering postsecondary education credit or degrees says an institution must be accredited by a U.S. Department of Education-approved agency or actively seeking accreditation for no more than five years while operating in South Dakota under an affiliation agreement with an accredited institution. The statute makes operating without an agreement a misdemeanor with a $25,000 civil penalty.
• Northern Virginia had such an agreement with IGlobal, an accredited online school. That agreement was in place only until December, when IGlobal canceled the partnership. David Sohn, IGlobal's president and chief executive, said he signed the agreement with the understanding that qualified students from Northern Virginia would be able to take online IGlobal masters of business administration courses. But Sohn said he didn't know at the time that the University of Northern Virginia lacked national accreditation, making those credits unable to transfer to IGlobal.

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