International Education Week

AACRAO International held its 13th Annual Winter Institute for International Transfer Credit at the Hyatt Centric hotel in Arlington, Virginia on February 5-8, 2018.  The theme of this year’s institute was the Winter Olympics, a concept thought up by Julia Funaki, Associate Director of AACRAO International and also one of the trainers at the institute.  Julia thought it would be a fun way to get hyped up for the Winter Olympics and make the training more interactive.  

In total, 40 participants (ranging from those with very little experience, to over 20 years of experience) came together for 4 days with one common purpose, to learn more about calculating transfer credit from different countries.  Throughout the week, participants were given various sample documents and asked to research recognition status of the university, determine credit conversion, and work with various grading scales. They were also asked to discuss how their institution would handle that document if it were to arrive on their campus.  Would the same domestic admissions policies also apply to international transcripts?

Here are what some of our attendees had to say about the training:

• “The training overall was clear and easy to follow”

• “I enjoyed hearing different perspectives from different instructors”

• “I learned an enormous amount and feel much better equipped to process the international credit information I encounter in the future”

• “All of the instructors were fantastic!”

• “I thought the training was well organized!”

The 4-day workshop was set up in a way where participants were assigned a table representing a Winter Olympic sport.  Throughout the week, each sport (table group) competes for “medals” which are awarded when each team answers questions correctly during the sample document training exercises.   At the end of each day, the tables with the most medals will win rings in different Olympic flag colors.  The ultimate goal at the end of the training is to have the most number of “completed olympic flags”, which are assembled with the rings that were won throughout the week. The participants at the winning table were then entered into a random drawing where one winner will win a waived registration to any AACRAO International training/workshop in the near future.  This year’s winner was Debbie Gibbs from Clayton State University! Debbie is new to international education and said that she could benefit greatly with more training.  Congratulations Debbie!

Winter Institute was a great opportunity for everyone to reconnect with old colleagues and make new friends. Together, they no longer felt alone in tackling the stress associated with international transcript evaluation.  To learn more about AACRAO International training opportunities like Winter Institute, please click here.

The next AACRAO International training will be a 1-Day workshop at the AACRAO Annual Meeting in Orlando, Florida on March 24.  Click here to learn more.

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