Transfer Credit and Degree Completion

Provide official transcripts from each college or university where academic credit was earned. Transcripts are considered official if:

• Sent directly from the transferring institution to NDSU
• Submitted by the student in the sealed envelope provided by the transferring institution

Send your transcripts to: 
New Students:
NDSU Office of Admission
Dept 2832 PO Box 6050
Fargo ND 58108-6050
ndsu.admission@ndsu.edu

Current/Previous Students:
NDSU Registration and Records
Dept 2801 PO Box 6050
Fargo ND 58108-6050
ndsu.registrar@ndsu.edu

Dual Career/PSEO/College in the Schools:
If you earned college credit while in high school, official transcripts from each college/university where credit was earned must also be sent to NDSU for evaluation of credit. We do not accept college-level credit off of high school transcripts.

Credit by Exam
If you have taken, AP, CLEP, DSST or IB examinations, please have an official copy of the examination results sent to our office for credit evaluation. Information on what credit will be awarded for examinations can be found on the Credit by Examination section in our catalog.
 

Transfer credit evaluations are conducted in the Office of Registration and Records. The evaluation process begins after a student is admitted to the university by the Office of Admission.

Once admitted, the Office of Registration and Records will receive your transcripts from the Office of Admission. The typical timeframe for processing transfer credits is 1-3 weeks depending on the time of year. Between semesters and during the summer, processing time is closer to three weeks.

Your transcript will be reviewed for courses equivalencies and added into Campus Connection. You will receive an email from the Office of Registration and Records once that process is complete which will instruct you to view your Advising Transcript. 

Remaining degree requirements can be viewed in Campus Connection through the Academic Requirements Report. This report will show completed and remaining courses needed to earn a degree. (Any additional transfer credits received after initial evaluation will appear in Campus Connection when they are received and processed by our office.)

The Transfer Credit Policy in its entirety can be found in the NDSU Catalog: Transfer and Test Credit.

Re-Evaluation of Transfer Courses
Students may request to have a course equivalency re-evaluated by submitting a copy of the course syllabus to the Office of Registration & Records in person at Ceres Hall 110 or via email to ndsu.transfer@ndsu.edu. Please include your student ID number and the NDSU course that is most similar.

Transfer Codes
As you review your Transfer Credit Report you may see one of the following codes:

All syllabi and course descriptions may be submitted in person to the Office of Registration & Records, Ceres Hall 110, or via email to ndsu.transfer@ndsu.edu.

Courses earned through non-accredited institutions or those that are remedial by definition of the transferring institutions or equivalent to a remedial course at NDSU will not be accepted in transfer.

The applicability of transfer credits toward your intended program of study is determined by the respective Academic Department upon admission to NDSU. The Office of Registration and Records may determine the suitability of your coursework to fulfill general education requirements, pre-requisites or lower-level courses.

For practical purposes there are three main types of transfer credit that you will see on your Academic Requirements Report:

• Credit for program requirements and college specific courses (determined by each academic college and department)
• Credit for general education requirements (determined by institution and North Dakota University System guidelines)
• Credit for electives (courses that do not have a course equivalent at NDSU). These may be program specific (ENGL 1XX, MATH 2XX, etc.) or free electives (TRNSFER 1XX, 2XX, etc.) in which NDSU does not have a similar program.
  • Free elective courses may only count toward total credits. Applicability to program requirements will be determined by the academic department of the student’s major

Completion of General Education Curriculum

Students transferring to NDSU after having completed an Associate of Science or Associate of Arts are considered to have completed their lower-division general education requirements at NDSU as long as that institution is accredited by a qualifying accreditor. Please see the list of acceptable accreditations in our Transfer and Test Credit policy.

Students who have completed the Minnesota Transfer Curriculum (MNTC) OR who qualify under the NDUS GERTA agreement will also fulfill the lower general education requirements.

General education courses from other accredited institutions, that transfer to NDSU as electives may be accepted in transfer as part of the general education requirements at NDSU. The Transfer Equivalency System will show which transfer courses fulfill general education requirements.

Transfer students who have only partially fulfilled general education category requirements by transfer-approved courses must complete the requirements in approved courses within the NDSU deficient categories. No category credit requirement may be deficient by more than a partial semester credit. However, in the communication category, if the transfer course(s) have been evaluated as equivalent to ENGL 110 College Composition I, ENGL 120 College Composition II, and COMM 110 Fundamentals of Public Speaking and total no less than eight semester credits, the lower-division category requirement has been met.

Students who have transferred in credit for ENGL 120 College Composition II but not credit for ENGL 110 College Composition I will earn placement credit for ENGL 110 upon completion of their Upper Division Writing requirement with a C or better.

Our full General Education curriculum and policy can be found in the NDSU Catalog under General Education.

Students are strongly encouraged to begin planning to transfer as soon as possible. Successful transfer students will meet regularly with their current adviser as well as an adviser at NDSU and follow curriculum and transfer guidance provided by the NDSU website.

The Undergraduate Degree and Graduation Information policy can be found in our catalog.

Students are responsible for knowing academic policies that could impact transferability of courses as well as degree completion. Assistance with these questions and concerns can be directed to the Office of Registration and Records. 

No four-year requirement, just residency. See policy #6 for university-wide degree requirements in catalog. Within these 30 resident credits, minimum requirements include 15 semester credits in courses numbered 300 or above and 15 semester credits in the major field of study.

Residency Credits:
Residence credits include credits registered and paid for at NDSU. These may include courses offered on the NDSU campus or Tri-College. At least 30 credits must be NDSU resident credits.

Upper Division Credits:
At least 36 of the credits presented for graduation must be in courses taken at the 300 and 400 level.

Per the NDSU Repeat Policy, once a course has been taken and completed at NDSU, it must be repeated at NDSU. 

If a course is repeated at a single institution, the repeat attempts will be recorded in transfer as the issuing institution has recorded on the transcript. The NDSU Repeat policy will apply to students who have repeated courses between multiple institutions.