Amherst College
IL-1: Reporting Assurance

An institution earns 1 bonus point when it has obtained external assurance that all of the information in the institution’s current STARS report is reported in accordance with credit criteria. Partial points are available. An institution earns 0.5 bonus points when it has completed its own comprehensive independent review process to identify and resolve inconsistencies and errors in the institution’s STARS report prior to submitting it to AASHE, but has not obtained external assurance.

Measurement

The review process(es) reported for this credit must be guided by and documented in the STARS Review Template (available for download from the STARS website). To qualify, each credit that has been substantively updated since the institution’s previous report must be reviewed and any inconsistencies or errors that are identified must be successfully resolved prior to submitting the report to AASHE. 

Independent review may include personnel affiliated with the institution as long as they are not involved in data collection for the credits they review. Other forms of internal review and data quality controls, while valuable, do not qualify for this credit and should be documented instead in PRE 4: Reporting Methodologies.

Please note that all reports are subject to review by AASHE staff prior to publication, which may require additional revisions. AASHE reserves the right to withhold points for this credit if it is determined that the review process was clearly unsuccessful in identifying and resolving inconsistencies or errors (e.g., when AASHE staff identify a significant number of issues not captured in the completed review template). Published reports are also subject to public data inquiries and periodic audits by AASHE staff.

This credit is optional.