A Lean First Year

ABOCE is launching with a deliberately lean operating model. During its first year, the organization is expected to operate without full-time staff. Its early progress will be driven primarily by the volunteer leadership of the Board of Directors, founding partners, committee members, and expert contributors who are committed to building a credible accreditation pathway for offsite construction degree programs. This approach keeps early overhead low. It also means that every dollar raised must be used carefully. Early funds are not intended to support a large administrative apparatus. They are intended to make targeted capital outlays that help ABOCE move from founding agreement to operational capacity.

Strategic Use of Early Support

Early funding will support the essential work required to form a high-functioning accrediting body. That includes organizing the Board, preparing governance materials, developing committee structures, supporting legal and administrative formation, and creating the systems needed for transparent decision-making. A strong board-led launch requires more than goodwill. It requires the right documents, calendars, workflows, meeting structures, recordkeeping systems, and public-facing materials. Funding will also support the drafting of ABOCE’s first Conditions for Accreditation and Procedures for Accreditation. These documents must be developed with care, drawing on the finest available leadership from higher education, offsite construction, accreditation, manufacturing, design, engineering, construction, and workforce development.

Field-Building and Early Adoption

A key use of funds will be outreach to academic institutions that are well positioned to become early adopters. ABOCE will need to organize visits, meetings, and presentations with schools that already have strong architecture, engineering, construction management, manufacturing, or interdisciplinary built-environment programs. These conversations are essential to test the accreditation framework, understand institutional barriers, recruit early participants, and build confidence among faculty and administrators. Support may be used to help Board members and founding representatives visit key schools, convene curriculum discussions, meet with deans and department chairs, and identify institutions ready to explore offsite construction degree accreditation.

What Early Contributions Make Possible

Founding support helps ABOCE complete the work that must happen before accreditation can operate at scale. Early contributions may support:

• board formation and governance infrastructure;
• legal and administrative setup;
• drafting and review of Conditions and Procedures;
• development of model curriculum resources;
• visiting-team planning and reviewer infrastructure;
• outreach to early-adopter institutions;
• website, communications, and public-information materials;
• meetings, workshops, and school visits that build adoption.

Each of these investments helps create the foundation for a durable accrediting body.

Built for Stewardship

ABOCE’s first-year funding model reflects the organization’s founding purpose. Accreditation is a public-trust function. It requires independence, transparency, procedural care, and long-term credibility. The early use of funds must therefore be disciplined. The goal is to invest in the infrastructure that makes accreditation trustworthy: governance, standards, procedures, peer review, academic outreach, and responsible public communication. As ABOCE grows, future funding may support staff capacity, expanded reviewer training, formal accreditation management systems, public reporting, research, and broader institutional outreach. In the launch phase, however, the priority is clear: build the board, draft the standards, organize the process, and engage the first schools.

Support the Launch

ABOCE invites donors, partners, institutions, and industry leaders to support this founding phase. Early support will help convert a historic agreement between the Center for Offsite Construction and the Modular Building Institute into a functioning accrediting body for the future of offsite construction education.