Transcript Problems

Discussion in 'General Distance Learning Discussions' started by billy, May 24, 2001.

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  1. billy

    billy New Member

    I'm really hitting a wall here for something really silly when I examine the application process for US Universities. Due to the avaliability of high definition colour printers I understand why DL universities require student's transcripts to be send directly to the admission offices.

    My local university do not provides such a service (I think- I gave up after a dozen calls, postage charges, use of official envelopes etc.) I can buy more original transcripts but they are not sending them for me directly.

    Getting my masters transcripts from the Australia University - same problem. As I cease to be a student years ago I do not have a student account and well I have to pay over the counter and so on . (Great I'm only eight hours flight away.)

    The few transcripts I have on hand is really really precious I need them for job interviews etc.

    For British schools there are the British Council where there are education officials who verify photocopies against originals and things like that.

    In a typical US embassy is there anybody fulfilling such a role and mail the package to the universities on your behalf? If the university concern do accept such verification...


    Billy
     
  2. joybaum

    joybaum New Member

    What's even MORE bizarre to me is that the University of London doesn't want transcripts! All they want to see are my original diplomas!
     
  3. BillDayson

    BillDayson New Member

    What is your local university and where is "local"?

    Among American universities, sending sealed transcripts directly to other parties is a standard service.

    If your university is outside the US, they may be less familiar with the practice. But you say that they do have transcripts. I am assuming that they will mail them out as well, since many of their former students probably no longer live close enough to pick them up in person.

    So why not just ask them to put the transcripts in a university printed envelope and instead of sending them to your home address, just send them to the admissions office address you specify?

    It may be the word "sealed" that is throwing them off. They may think that it is some elaborate American legal procedure or something. So just tell them to shove the transcripts in a printed university envelope and mail them off. See if that works. I bet it will. The university will probably want your request in writing, and you may have to pay a processing fee to cover postage, but that's cool.

    They must have a process for requesting transcripts by mail. Australia is a huge country, the size of the United States. What if a person attends the University of Sydney, then needs transcripts after taking a job in Perth?

    I can't imagine that your not having a current student number makes any difference either. Transcripts are usually requested by former students. In the US, universities keep transcripts on file (on microfilm or something) indefinitely. When I applied to CSUDH in the late 1990's, I requested transcripts of courses I took at another university in the late 1960's, thirty years before. No problem, my old university sent them out.

    Keep them and don't send them. The American universities that want transcripts don't want your personal copies (which may have been altered), they want copies sent direct from your old universities.

    Probably there is. I'm expect that somebody from the education branch of the consular section would do it for you if you asked. But I don't really see the point. How could a US embassy verify the authenticity of your transcript unless they received a copy directly from the university and not from you? So if your former university is prepared to supply the embassy with a fresh copy of your transcript, why not ask the university to send it to your new university directly and forget the embassy?

    I really think that people are simply unfamiliar with what they are being asked to do and are making it into something more than it is. They don't need to put a wax seal on the envelope, press a signet ring into it, then chant and burn incense. They just need to have a clerk make a copy of your transcripts, shove them into a university envelope, then toss it in the outgoing mail bin.
     
  4. John Bear

    John Bear Senior Member

    joybaum writes, What's even MORE bizarre to me is that the University of London doesn't want transcripts! All they want to see are my original diplomas!

    In the exhibit hall at the registrars' convention last month, there were a number of companies offering products and services in the direction of transcript and diploma security. One of the more intriguing ones printed diplomas with a microscopically tiny registration number for each student, which could not be copied photographically or xerographically.

    But most schools don't do this -- so I wonder what precautions London takes, in this day and age where excellent copies of diplomas can be purchased. I suspect my fake Harvard M.D. would stand up to pretty close scrutiny, should I choose to trip off the tiny type line at the very bottom that says that it is a "novelty item."
     
  5. Dennis

    Dennis New Member

    Bill Dayson wrote:
    I can't imagine that your not having a current student number makes any difference either. Transcripts are usually requested by former students. In the US, universities keep transcripts on file (on microfilm or something) indefinitely. When I applied to CSUDH in the late 1990's, I requested transcripts of courses I took at another university in the late 1960's, thirty years before. No problem, my old university sent them out.


    apropos of keeping transcripts, what happens to them in case
    a school goes out of business or ceases to exist for some reason? Go your transcripts lost in this situation?

    Dennis Siemens
     

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