Junior Eliza Howe knew that she wanted to transfer to Tufts after just one year at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio. She labored over applications and the hassles of changing schools. But when she got to Tufts, she found that two of her half-credit courses would not be transferable.
"If I had some way of knowing before I applied to Tufts that my credits were not going to transfer, I would not have wasted my time with those half-credit courses when I knew I was going to transfer," Howe said. "It would have saved me a lot of time."
This situation is not unusual for the 50 to 100 transfer students who get accepted to Tufts each year. And the credit system is frequently an area of contention for both students from other schools and those who have received credit elsewhere, such as abroad programs.
At Tufts, transfer credits are considered by individual departments. Denny Paredes, associate director of undergraduate admissions, feels that the university takes significant strides to make this process as painless as possible for its students.
Paredes described the transfer application process as relatively straightforward and simple for the applicant.
"The [specific] transferability of courses taken at another school is not a factor in a student's admission to Tufts as a transfer," Paredes said. "We look more at the strength of their curriculum as an admitting factor."
Once students are admitted to Tufts, they have several options to go about getting their credits transferred. Jean Herbert, associate dean of undergraduate education, explained the transfer of credit process.
"We provide the accepted transfer students with access to WebCenter, and many of them use this process just as currently enrolled students do," Herbert said in an e-mail. "For those students who don't, we have a paper form."
The paper form of this process involves students going to each department and applying for credit transfer. To make this process easier on transfer students, the admissions office holds a meeting during orientation at which representatives from different departments discuss and approve courses taken at other colleges for credit.
"In the fall, when we might have many transfer students, we arrange a meeting during orientation so that all the transfer of credit representatives are in one location, and the students go around and get signatures in a few hours," Herbert said.
While this process seems relatively painless, both administrators and students agree that there is room for improvement, and many students have a difficult time fully understanding the process.
It's not just transfer students that have encountered difficulties — junior Zach Greenky, who is currently studying abroad in Amsterdam, explained the complications of trying to transfer credits from a study abroad program.
"Being abroad in a non-Tufts program that was non pre-approved, the whole issue of credit transfer was definitely a bit convoluted," Greenky said "If the process was a little more centralized and organized, whether it be a Web site or just better information, it would have saved me a great deal of hassle."
Junior Becky Gallagher is experiencing similar difficulties in trying to figure out how to transfer her credits from the Council on International Education Exchange program she did in Chile last semester.
"I had already had my classes approved on the Tufts transfer of credits Web site before I left, but now I'm confused about what happens," she said. "When Tufts gets my [abroad] transcript, do the departments automatically approve my classes for my major? When and where do things show up? And what do I have to do? The stakes are high for getting them to transfer ... some classes are only offered in the spring or fall, and if some don't transfer, I might have to take one over the summer."
In New Hampshire, colleges and universities are addressing the issue of transfer credits with an inter-school online resource called NHTransfer, a Web site where students can log on and find out exactly which of their courses will be approved for credit transfer from other schools in the area.
Howe said that a system like the one in New Hampshire would have been helpful when she was originally deciding which classes to take at Miami. But in order for it to be useful for students like her, who transferred to a different state, the program would have to broaden.
"I don't think a resource [like NHTransfer] would have necessarily changed my decision about where to transfer, because I knew I wanted to come to Tufts," Howe said. "But it certainly would have been a useful resource."
According to Herbert, there are no current plans to adopt the same program in Massachusetts; however, the admissions office is considering various options in order to make students more aware of their credit status before they apply and decide to transfer to Tufts.
"We have talked of having a history of what courses have transferred available online to prospective students," Herbert said. "However, courses frequently change, and our faculty like to be able to assess each class. I try to be available to prospective students to let them know what classes are likely to be approved."
Paredes said that while prospective transfers would certainly benefit from an online resource like NHTransfer, schools like Tufts receive too many applications from transfer students around the globe to effectively implement the system.
"Students would certainly love to have that information ahead of time, so that's something we can consider," Paredes said. "But it's really a process handled on a more individual basis by each department."
