To want degree info?

[Famalamaringwrong]

Sorry this is not really a meaty Saturday night AIBU

However, I went to uni in 2003 for 1 year then dropped out. I studied law and philosophy and i remember distinctly passing that 1 year. It was not a good time in my life and i was drunk most of the time I'm ashamed to say so the details are hazy.

I'd now like to use this year of uni towards some further education - a friend mentioned I could use the! "Credits" of that year to maybe start the new degree/qualification in year 2 instead of right from the bottom? I have no idea about all this stuff so any academics on here please advise me if this is possible and how it works. Thank you!

I’m not completely sure but I thought credits only lasted 10 years.

So step one is to contact your university and ask for documentation to support that you passed - a grade transcript.

Then find the course you want to do and ask whether they will accept your existing grades as transfer credits. It may be that they won't as they are too old or not relevant. but they may or may accept at a discounted tariff - ie. you did a year they will set it off against half a year.

Also be wary of you grades - if they are not good but you'd do better now if may be better starting again so your end degree is better.

You can only use Recognition of Prior Learning (RPL) if they are equivalent modules to the ones you have studied and those you will be studying. Usually that decision is made by a committee(as in our uni). So we request to students previous programme details and identify if they match suitably.

My degree only had credits for 2nd and 3rd year. You'll need to ring your original uni and ask and then get a transcript if they keven keep records that far back for uncompleted courses. You'll also need to check with the uni course you want to do to see if they accept credits from a first year that was 15 years ago. Just phone them and ask.

Ok this is unchartered territory for me so I will contact the uni. Its Oxford Brookes if that makes a difference. I would say I probably did ok but i have no idea. I'm not too worried about grades it's just having a degree will enable me to transfer from one career to another so i would find a relevant enough degree that would take the credits if needed. If that makes any sense!

I have lots of professional qualifications but for the career I'm looking to switch to I have to have a degree - any degree! Which seems mad to me but anyway.

There is something called APEL which is Accreditation of Prior Experiential Learning. It may be you can do that. Try the OU.

Thank you all such helpful advice so far

You are sort of right but generally it's more for switching institution straight away eg when people's circumstances change and they need to return home. I think they may expire too as part time degrees have to be completed within a certain time period. They may be getting confused with American university's with have fully transferable credits

Usually the first year of a degree is teacher assessment only so not transferable and not official

@maddy68 not either of my two degrees - for one the grades weren't counted for the overall degree class but they were still externally audited marks.

The only people that will be able to tell you is the institution you are applying for. Contact your old university and ask them to confirm if you were awarded any credits then go from there. You cannot transfer credits if they were used to gain a qualification eg started studying one qualification and didn't finish so were awarded a lower level qualification. I administrate a lot of BSc, CertHE and DipHE programs at work and some institutions will accept for some courses and not others.

Definitely worth asking OP as I did (more than a decade later) and managed to go straight in at second year. I had to get a transcript from my first Uni showing what I’d studied and descriptions of what the modules I’d done covered. I then sent this to the institution I wanted to study with, along with info as to what course I wanted to apply them towards - it was pretty straightforward actually.

As I transferred the credits to a different Uni (it was the OU ultimately) they just credited me for that year - they didn’t carry the result over though so my 2:1 was based on what I achieved in second and third year only. I found the OU application helpline massively helpful if you’re considering them.

@LondonNQT thank you that's great advice and I'm glad it worked out for you. I wonder if the OU are more open to this type of thing?

They probably are and just more used to these sort of requests! Definitely give them a call - it can’t hurt to know what your starting position might be and it costs nothing.

Worked for me. I transferred the full available credits and I’ve therefore only had to study two modules now. Hoping to do postgrad straight after. This is with OU.