Using the Assurance System

Institutions use the Assurance System to provide their narrative, evidence and other materials for comprehensive evaluations, Assurance Reviews and evaluations related to seeking initial accreditation. Peer review teams also access the system to conduct reviews and draft their analysis and recommendations. Members of HLC’s decision-making bodies use the system to review institutional materials and team reports as part of the decision-making process.

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Links & Documents Institutions Peer Reviewers Training and Support

Assurance Filings Moving to Canopy Starting in 2025

With the transition to HLC’s revised Criteria for Accreditation in September 2025, HLC will also streamline the technology that supports comprehensive evaluations and Assurance Reviews. The current stand-alone Assurance System will be sunset, and institutions and peer reviewers will conduct their work for these reviews in Canopy.

Institutions will be given access to the new Assurance Filing section in Canopy on a rolling basis based on the date of their next comprehensive evaluation, Assurance Review, or evaluation related to seeking accreditation. See the Revised Criteria and Assumed Practices: Overview and Timeline for additional details.

In preparation for this change, institutions that will not undergo a review in the Assurance System before September 1, 2025, may begin exporting their materials from the system. See Exporting Materials From the Assurance System for instructions.

Institutional Use of the Assurance System

The institution’s users may log in to the system at any time throughout their pathway cycle to upload and maintain documents.

User Types

Users of the Assurance System are divided into three groups. Regardless of the group, each user is included in the count toward the 15 users allowed in the system.

Coordinator

System coordinators have the ability to create and delete users, assign due dates, add evidence to the Evidence File, edit the Assurance Argument, and will ultimately lock the Assurance Filing for submittal. Although the institution is limited to one Primary Assurance System Coordinator who receives communications from HLC regarding the system, the institution may designate two more users at the “coordinator” level (for a total of three coordinators).

Contributor

Contributors may add evidence to the Evidence File and draft, edit and delete material from the Assurance Argument.

Read-Only User

These users only have access to review the Assurance Argument and Evidence File. They do not have the ability to edit, draft or delete any material.

Access to the System

HLC grants access to the institution’s space within Assurance System to one official designee at the institution to serve as the Primary Assurance System Coordinator. This is typically the coordinator of the institution’s accreditation efforts.

The Primary System Coordinator identified for an institution should:

  • Have facility using a web browser and knowledge of how to create PDF documents.
  • Have a basic understanding of the accreditation process or willingness to learn.
  • Have knowledge of which individuals and groups at an institution might be helpful in providing documentation supporting the accreditation process.
  • Be able to organize electronic materials and delegate tasks to others.
  • Have an email account through the institution’s email system. (This becomes the login ID for the Assurance System; the ID must be from an email account provided by an institution. Personal email accounts such as Gmail or Yahoo are not permitted.)

The Primary Assurance System Coordinator may grant access to a maximum of 14 additional individuals to work within the Assurance System. HLC will assign a password to each person who gains access to the system and each user may change his or her password after they log in the first time. The institution is responsible for granting or revoking this access; HLC does not manage the additional accounts.

Primary Assurance System Coordinator Change

Institutions should not update the role or status of their Primary Assurance System Coordinator in the system. If the primary coordinator changes, the institution’s Accreditation Liaison Officer, Chief Executive Officer or Data Update Coordinator should submit the new coordinator’s information in the Contact Update in Canopy. See the Canopy User Guide for instructions on completing the survey.

Managing Content

The institution will draft its Assurance Argument within the Assurance System. Only one user at a time is able to edit a section of the Argument. The rest of the team will be unable to open the section until the current user has finished working on it and checks it back into the system.

The Assurance System includes an activity log that maintains a history of additions, deletions or changes. This log is available to both the institution and HLC.

HLC will preload certain information into the Assurance System. The Criteria and Core Component text will be loaded into the appropriate sections of the Assurance Argument. This preloaded material does not count against the maximum word allowance. The Evidence File contains HLC documents the institution may want to reference in its narrative.

Additional forms that are required as part of a review, such as the Federal Compliance Form, are also available in Assurance System.

Archiving Content

At the end of the Assurance Review or comprehensive evaluation process, HLC archives the Assurance Argument and Evidence File and activates a feature whereby the institution determines whether it wants to copy its Assurance Argument and/or Evidence File to use in its next review. The institution may choose to copy either or both sections, or to start its next review from scratch. Anything copied into the institution’s next review may be edited, revised or deleted as needed. The institution is responsible for maintaining long-term files outside of the Assurance System that it deems necessary for its own purposes.

Peer Review Use of Assurance System

The peer review team assigned to an institution will have access to the institution’s Assurance Argument after the institution’s lock date. The team will use the system to read the narrative and study the evidentiary material.

At the conclusion of the online review or, if applicable, the on-site visit, the team will use the Assurance System to write its report and recommendation. HLC staff will have access to the team’s work to enable consultation with peer reviewers.

Training and Support

New users should review the Assurance System user manual and FAQ list below for help navigating the system. The Help section of the Assurance System also provides a form for submitting questions to HLC. Assistance should be requested only through the system so HLC can keep an accurate record of possible issues.

Assurance System FAQs

You will receive a welcome email with your login information when your Assurance System account is created. Log in at assurance.hlcommission.org. Your username is your full institutional email address, and your password is provided in the welcome email. If you forget your password, click the “Forgot your password?” link on the login page to receive an email with instructions for resetting it.

First, make sure that these messages are not going to your junk, spam or clutter folders.

Second, ask your IT department to add the sending email address, [email protected], to the institution’s approved senders list.

Third, ask your IT department to verify that the email was never received by your mail server. If that is the case, contact HLC at [email protected] for further troubleshooting.

Please check to make sure your full email address is entered as the username and your browser isn’t auto-filling the field with the wrong information. If your email address changes, please notify HLC immediately at [email protected].

If the email address is correct, please be sure you are using your password for the Assurance System and not a different HLC system. Not all HLC systems are integrated and other systems (such as the Institutional Update) may use a different password.

Before locking the Assurance Filing, be sure that all sections of the narrative are marked as complete and that all required forms (Federal Compliance, Multi-campus, etc.) have been uploaded to the system.

Please test the link using a different web browser, such as Chrome, Firefox or Safari. Users have found that the functionality of these page-specific links is highly dependent on their web browser type, version and PDF viewer plugin. When adding this type of link, HLC recommends including a parenthetical note with the intended page number.

The system only allows users to link text in their Assurance Argument to materials in their Evidence File. Users may enter web addresses in their Evidence File for six specific types of resources—the institution’s course catalog, class schedules, faculty roster, and faculty, staff and student handbooks—but links to other webpages or online resources aren’t allowed.

All materials in the Evidence File must be linked in at least one section of the Assurance Argument. The peer review team cannot view documents in the Evidence File that aren’t linked within the text of the Assurance Argument.

Yes, an interim report that is due in conjunction with an Assurance Review or comprehensive evaluation should be addressed in the related Core Component as part of the Assurance Argument. It should not be a separate report.

No. Once the institution’s materials are locked, institutional users will have read-only access to them.