An organization’s accreditation application moves from draft to review through the API. This reference explains how to submit a draft application, what happens next, why Rhythm refuses a submission, and how to work with applications directly at any status.
Submitting a Draft Application for Review
To submit an application, send it with its status set to draft, and include the program, organization, applying contact, and application process. Rhythm moves the application to pending review and saves it, either by creating a new application or updating the existing one when you send its version. If the application process has its confirmation email switched on, Rhythm sends that email to the applying contact.
Warning
Submission checks the status you send in the request, not the status already saved on the application. If Rhythm already recorded an application as approved or declined, but you resubmit it with draft as its status, Rhythm moves it back to pending review and can send the confirmation email again. Only resubmit an application when you intend to send it back into review.
Why a Submission Is Refused
Rhythm refuses a submission and does not save the application when either of these conditions is true:
| Condition | What happens |
|---|---|
The application's status in the request is not draft | Rhythm refuses the submission |
| The application names no application process | Rhythm refuses the submission |
These checks do not catch a process identifier that points to a process that does not exist. Rhythm discovers that later, when it tries to read the process. If Rhythm cannot find the process, the request can fail after the application has already been saved as pending review. After a failed submission, check the application’s saved status instead of assuming nothing was saved.
Working with Applications Directly
Outside the submission flow, you can create, read, replace, patch, and delete an application directly. You can also set any of its four statuses — draft, pending review, approved, or declined — on any save. Rhythm does not check whether the status change follows a sensible order, so a direct save can move an application straight from draft to approved or back again.
Warning
Setting an application's status to approved directly does not do anything else on its own: it does not create the school's accreditation record. See below.
You can also list an organization’s applications, oldest first, by naming the organization.
Turning an Approved Application Into an Accreditation
Today, you cannot turn an approved application into the school’s accreditation in the Console, in the Portal, or through the API. Approving an application only changes the application’s own saved status. If your association wants an accreditation record for an approved applicant, your staff add the accreditation directly, the same way they would for any new school.
Related
- Accreditation Console and API Addresses
- Accreditations Through the API
- Configure Application Processes
- Add a School to a Program