At the urging of the U.S. Department of Education, regional accrediting organizations have, during the last few years, placed much greater emphasis on implementation of assessment as a requirement for accreditation. Assessment serves two important purposes: institutional survival and improvement of student achievement. Of these two, survival is the most important. When an institution is preparing for a review by an accrediting agency, it may be prudent to minimize or postpone important, but nonessential, and sometimes contentious and divisive discussions about discipline-related assessment theories and pedagogical best practices. This article summarizes and interprets the accreditation experience, and its aftermath, within the professional writing program at the University of Houston-Downtown.