Transfer Advising for Students Transferring INTO MC

Students transferring in from other colleges to MC often want to know what they need to take at MC to be able to transfer to other 4-year schools – especially how to get into UM College Park.

It gets complicated when looking over a transcript from another college before it has been officially evaluated.  But two useful tools can be consulted:

1.  See how courses will be accepted by MC through:  TES – the MC Course Equivalency Database – TES Link:  https://tes.collegesource.com/publicview/TES_publicview01.aspx?rid=05b6dfbb-f8e4-4429-951b-2c08de9c55eb&aid=ec3b76c0-5bc7-4bad-84f0-586f5490b4ba      Find it easily by typing “Transfer Equivalency” into the MC Search Box, the result is this Course Equivalencies Page:  https://www.montgomerycollege.edu/academics/transfer/course-equivalencies.html
2.  And use UM’s Transfer Credit Services Course Database https://app.transfercredit.umd.edu/  (bookmark this?!)

It’s not always consistent, sometimes MC will accept an ENGL course as our ENGL 102 but UM will not accept that same course as their ENGL 101 / FSAW Fundamental Studies Academic Writing course.   Ditto for a college-level math – FSMA Fundamental Studies Math…

So it’s important to check!  And although we could just say to a student “You need to check on this” – looking at how UM lists their courses can be confusing so if we can do this with them with a caution to double-check themselves also, it may help get the student enrolled in the right courses sooner. 

Example:  Wesley College – Delaware’s EN 100 and 101 – here’s a comparison of how they transfer (and how confusing they look!)

MC TES:

MONTGOMERY COLLEGE

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INSTITUTION LIST  EQUIVALENCY LIST

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	WESLEY COLLEGE	MONTGOMERY COLLEGE	NOTE?	BEGIN	END
	AR109 PAINTING I (3)	ARTT 211 PAINTING I (3)		01/01/1995
	BA100 INTRODUCTION TO BUSINESS (3)	BSAD 101 INTRODUCTION TO BUSINESS (3)		01/01/1995
	EN100 COLLEGE WRITING (3)	ENGL 101 INTRODUCTION TO COLLEGE WRITING (3)		01/01/1995
	EN101 COLLEGE WRITING II (3)	ENGL 102 CRITICAL READING, WRITING, AND RESEARCH (3)		01/01/1995

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UM TCE Database:    Wesley College DE

EN100	COLLEGE WRITING	Not Accepted					Summer II 2016
EN100	COLLEGE WRITING	Accepted L1			PF	Fall 2016	Summer II 2023
EN101	LITERATURE FOR COMP	Accepted L1					Summer II 2016
EN101	LITERATURE FOR COMP	Accepted L1			PF	Fall 2016	Summer II 2023

L1 = Lower Level Elective

PF = Visit UM ENGL 101 Office for details of review

[and the reason there is now a “window” of time on equivalencies is that UM is trying to review all courses after a certain number of years, in this case, in 7 years, so it doesn’t mean that there is an expiration date but it is a reminder to UM to review]

For this student, I advised getting a current copy of the EN 100 and EN 101 syllabi and contacting the UM English Office directly.  The key question is whether the student wrote a research paper in an English course, if yes, then it’s worth asking UM whether the course might fulfill the FSAW writing requirement.  Can’t hurt to ask, especially because the course description does refer to a research paper which is an important aspect of meeting the State of Maryland’s definition of a college writing course:

Wesley College’s
EN101 College Writing II Provides continued study and practice of expository writing, with emphasis on research writing, including effective gathering and organizing of materials for critical thinking and writing the library research paper. Students also receive continued practice in writing the summary and the paraphrase and learn correct documentation. Prerequisite: EN100 with a grade of C or better. A grade of C or better in EN101 is required to earn graduation credit. (Offered each semester.) 3 credits

The next question that pops up is “If MC accepts the course as ENGL 102, doesn’t UM have to accept it that way also?”  Short answer: “No” - especially if the student is trying to transfer prior to finishing an Associates degree - proving that the key elements of a college-level English and college-level math have been completed is dependent on a review of all transcripts, not just the MC transcript.

Scary – but better to alert a student to a possible transfer issue early on rather than making an assumption that the MC evaluation is the final answer.