If you received a foreign degree and decided to enter the U.S. for education, employment, or immigration, you will probably need a foreign education evaluation to determine the U.S. equivalency of your degree. Although finding a foreign credential evaluation agency isn’t too difficult, finding a good one can be extremely tough, and knowing exactly what type of educational evaluation you need is important too. Just how easy is it to choose between the different types of evaluations?

In reality, a good agency will be able to tell you upon examining your application whether or not you’ve made the right choice. While certain types of evaluations may be acceptable for work, you may need a more specific type of evaluation, such as a course-by-course evaluation, for university admission. The difference can be even more critical if you are planning to apply for an immigration visa such as an H1-B or I-140 visa.

Most applicants have some idea of what type of evaluation they need. Most reputable agencies, however, know exactly which type of evaluation will work for a specific purpose. For example, some people are unaware that educational degrees cannot be combined when filing for an I-140. Occasionally, clients become frustrated and seek other alternatives when a good agency refuses to provide them with an educational evaluation that will not help them.

In a few instances, clients seek foreign credential evaluations, only to demand the kind of evaluation they believe will be best for them. They don’t understand the details of immigration visa requirements, and are sure that their opinion regarding their educational equivalency is correct. Rather than trust the experts, they would prefer to make their own decisions – even if they waste hundreds of dollars of their own money doing so.

Foreign credential evaluation agencies can be expensive, and paying the cost of a professional translator may seem like an added, unnecessary expense. It may seem just as convenient to have a “friend” translate, or find someone who agrees to translate it for a very small fee. After all, what difference can one or two little words make?

In fact, even a single word or letter can be critical to a favorable educational evaluation. For example, the misalignment of a single column can result in the wrong grade for a course, or the wrong number of credits being assigned to a course. Likewise, being unfamiliar with advanced terms in course subjects, an inexperienced translator could assign a key mathematics course as algebra rather than calculus, which could be very detrimental for the student with a foreign degree.

Many immigration attorneys and foreign education credential evaluation services, such as Career Consulting International, work with translator services on a regular basis. While these agencies do not require people seeking U.S. equivalencies for their diplomas to use a particular translator, they are able to recommend high quality companies that have historically offered high quality translations. Furthermore, their professional reports leave no room for clerical errors.

The visa application process can be expensive and time-consuming. Frequently, people are in a hurry to have their visas approved for employment or education reasons. They have little time for making multiple corrections to evaluation reports that contain multiple errors as a result of erroneous translations. Taking a moment to carefully select a good professional translator can save a lot of future time and trouble. Spend the extra time with your family and friends, rather than making corrections and fielding the hassles caused by poor translations.

Medical schools occasionally go out of their way to recruit students with diverse ethnic or minority backgrounds. While some people like to blame this on equal opportunity employment issues, the real fact is that the United States is an ethnically diverse country. Sometimes, these students have a unique ability to understand and relate to the cultural customs and traditions valued by people of the same ethnic background.

While a significant number of medical students are minority students, many other physicians come to this country to practice after obtaining a foreign degree in their native country.  Often, however, doctors refrain from immigrating because they are concerned that their degree might not be accepted in the U.S.

In reality, however, nearly every medical degree obtained in a different country is given the U.S. equivalency of a diploma from a medical college. There are a few exceptions. For example, although degrees in homeopathic medicine may be recognized in other countries, these foreign education credentials are not accepted in this country. LIkewise, acupuncture degrees can rarely be shown through educational evaluations to be equivalent to a U.S degree.

If you are a physician who is considering immigrating to the United States, contact Career Consulting International for a credentials evaluation. Don’t immigrate and start your education all over again! Find out if your degree will qualify you to take medical boards and practice as a physician in the United States.

Usually, most people in the United States think of immigrant visas as “green cards,” documents that allow people from foreign countries to remain in the United States and work. Another very different type of visa, however, is granted to workers who desire to work in the U.S. for a time, but have expressed no desire to actually immigrate. Approximately 85,000 of these visas, known as H1-B visas, were issued to foreign citizens in 2008.

Professionals who hold these visas work in specialty occupations and have the U.S. equivalency of at least a bachelor degree in at least one specified discipline, such as science, the arts, theology, health or education. Several other specialty fields are included in this classification. For a complete list, consult the USCIS website.

In order to demonstrate that their foreign degrees or diplomas are equal to a U.S. degree, most workers are required to obtain an equivalency evaluation from a foreign credentials evaluation agency, such as Career Consulting International. This is particularly true for individuals from countries such as India, Pakistan, and some European Countries who hold 3-year degrees. These credential evaluations are also used for other purposes such as education and immigration, in the event that a person desires to apply for permanent resident status.

Generally, people who hold H1-B visas are allowed to remain in this country for three years after obtaining the visa. These visas can be renewed one time, and allow a person to remain in the U.S. as a temporary worker for up to six years total. Individuals interested in staying longer or becoming permanent residents should consider applying for I-140 status instead.

If you are considering attending university in the United States, or have been thinking about emigrating to the United States, you may require a foreign credentials evaluation. This will help to ensure that your foreign degree or diploma is recognized as a valid educational document.  If you are able to get these documents before leaving your home country, this can save you a great deal of time and trouble.

Important documents to keep on hand for submission to a foreign credentials evaluation agency such as Career Consulting International include copies of your passport, driver’s license, and marriage certificate. Transcripts or mark sheets, as well as degrees or diplomas, from your native country are also important.

Women who are submitting their foreign credentials for evaluation often wish to include their married name on the educational evaluation. In order to do this, they should submit a copy of their U.S. state-issued driver’s license, their passport with their married name, or their marriage certificate. This will greatly facilitate the credential evaluation process.

The process of locating foreign evaluation services can be difficult. One of the best ways to find a reputable service is to check with an immigration attorney or official translating service. These agencies often work with companies on a regular basis and know which companies will offer the most timely and accurate immigration evaluations.

by Sheila Danzig

Strangely it depends on where you got that degree and what you are using it for. In the US you can take four or more years to complete a degree. It has been reported that it can be completed by testing out in as little as 4 months see www.degree.com/new.

However if you are coming in from another country there is a good deal of controversy with many universities, educators and evaluators saying a bachelor’s degree is eqivalent to a bachelor’s degree. Certainly the UNESCO guidelines – which are legally binding – state that. However this is no guarantee that your non-US bachelor’s degree, even one that represents far more study hours than a US bachelor’s degree will be considered equivalent. While we as American’s seem to think we are the “gold standard” for world education looking at transcripts knows that many foreign degree holders have worked much harder than their conterparts in the US. For an interesting look at the Indian 3-Year Degree see http://degree.com/articles/3-year-indian-degree.html.

Recently, Career Consulting International was very pleased to receive feedback from a new customer: “Thank you so much for helping me obtain my educational evaluation in such a short period of time. I will be referring you to my friends as well.” We were pleased to be able to help this person with an evaluation report that offered the U.S. equivalency for their foreign degree.

We enjoy helping people, and we all enjoy reading the letters and comments from students and individuals who desire to obtain immigrant visas. Knowing that we have been able to help people achieve their goals and dreams is rewarding to all of us. So please, don’t hesitate to share your story.

If you or someone you know has been helped by TheDegreePeople through a foreign credential evaluation, write and let us know. We are always working to improve our process as well, so any suggestions for making the process easier for future customers are welcome as well.

Please stop by the guest blog and offer your input. Is there anything else that we can do to make the evaluation of your academic credentials any easier? Stop by and help us help you even more effectively!