Credit transfer is the academic procedure where most money gets wasted on translation, and nearly always for the same reason: people translate before asking what is needed. A complete study plan can run past a hundred pages. The syllabi for six courses, twenty. The price gap between ordering one and the other is wide, and it is settled with a single phone call.
This guide sorts out which documents exist, which one each university wants, and the order worth working in.
Who decides, and why that changes everything
In partial recognition of studies, the receiving university is in charge. Not the Ministry, not your home university, and not the translator. The institution that will admit you is the one that rules on which courses it counts as passed, and on what basis.
That has an immediate practical consequence: there is no universal list of documents. There is your university's list. And since that list governs, getting it in writing is the first step of the procedure — before you gather any paperwork at all.
Keep this separate from recognition of an entire qualification, which is a different thing with a different route: we cover it in the difference from degree homologation. Here we are talking about individual courses within a degree you are still studying.
Three documents that are not the same
Almost every problem in this process comes from calling three different things "the syllabus".
| Document | What it contains | What it is wanted for |
|---|---|---|
| Academic transcript | Courses taken, marks and credits | Proves what you passed and with what mark |
| Study plan | The full structure of the degree: subjects, years, credits | Places your degree as a whole |
| Course syllabus | Topics, objectives, reading list, hours, assessment method | Allows content to be compared course by course |
The third is what decides credit transfer, and it is also the one most people forget to request. The transcript says you passed "Statistics II"; the syllabus says what was inside "Statistics II". To judge whether it matches the receiving university's "Applied Statistics", you need the second.
The transcript is still needed as evidence, and usually travels in the same submission: that is where a sworn translation of your academic transcript comes in.
Which version to request from your home university
Not all syllabi are equally useful. When you ask your institution for them, be specific about three things:
- The academic year in which you took the course. Syllabi get updated. Today's version may not be the one you studied, and the assessor cares about yours.
- The study load, in credits or hours. Without it the comparison does not hold: a similar syllabus with half the contact hours does not transfer the same way.
- Evidence that it comes from the institution — the stamp, signature or verification method your university uses. A syllabus copied from a web page is a text with no authorship.
Ask for all three together, in one email. Asking one at a time adds weeks to a procedure that usually has a deadline.
How to organise a large dossier
When there are many courses, the order of the submission matters as much as the content. A legible dossier is assessed better and processed sooner. This model index works:
| Receiving course | Home course | Document supplied | Pages |
|---|---|---|---|
| Applied Statistics | Statistics II | 2024/25 syllabus + transcript | 4 + 1 |
| Microeconomics | Microeconomics I | 2023/24 syllabus | 3 |
| Commercial Law | (not claimed) | — | — |
With a table like that in front of them, the assessor sees at a glance what you are claiming, what you are using to justify it, and where each item is. And you see how many pages you are about to translate — which is exactly the figure you need in order to ask for a quote.
Two rules on dossier content: complete documents, without cropping the header or footer where the institution is identified; and annexes included, if a syllabus refers to one.
What to translate, and when to decide it
The right order is this: confirm with the receiving university the scope it accepts, then order the translation of exactly that scope.
Doing it the other way round is expensive in both directions. Translate the whole study plan when six syllabi would have done, and you have paid for pages nobody will read. Trim the syllabi yourself to save money when the university wanted them complete, and they come back to you — second round, second invoice.
Once you know the scope, what you need for documentation in English is a sworn translation from English into Spanish. And when asking for a quote, send the real page count: volumes in this procedure are large, and the difference between "some syllabi" and "31 pages" is the difference between an estimate and a price.
One last thing worth saying plainly: no translation recognises anything. What it does is put your documentation in a state where it can be assessed accurately. The decision is academic, the receiving university takes it, and anyone promising you an outcome is promising something that is not theirs to give.
Send us the complete syllabi for the scope you have had confirmed, the name of the receiving university and your deadline, and we will give you the exact price and turnaround.