Transfer Credits
General Education at SFU enhances undergraduate degrees by informing and complementing students’ programs of study, encouraging students to develop understandings and skills that equip them for life-long learning, and preparing them to appreciate, critique and contribute ideas and values of diverse, complex, and interdependent local and global communities in an ethical and comprehensive manner.
- BCCAT
- Transfer credits for International Baccalaureate (IB) and Advanced Placement (AP)
Course work taken at other post-secondary institutions may be eligible for transferable WQB designations provided the courses meet the following criteria:
- Courses must first articulate to SFU as either assigned credit (e.g. CHEM 121), unassigned credit (e.g. HIST 2XX) or general education credit (e.g. GE 1XX), before consideration for one or more of the WQB designations. Courses that have not yet been articulated to SFU must go through that procedure before being reviewed for WQB designation.
- Students must have achieved a minimum C- grade in the transfer course to receive designation credit.
- Transfer courses for review for W designation must have been taken from September 2004 onward for pedagogical reasons. Courses taken prior to September 2004 will not be reviewed for W. Courses for review for Q and B designations are not affected by the September 2004 date because they are content-based designations.
- Transfer credit received for International Baccalaureate or Advanced Placement programming may be eligible for Q and B designations, but not W designation.
NOTE: Students with transferable courses from BC colleges should refer to the online BC Transfer Guide to determine if a given course has already been assessed for WQB designation. Students with courses that do not transfer as assigned credit and are not granted WQB designations in the BC Transfer Guide, or students with courses from other BC universities or institutions outside of BC and Canada, may make a request through the Transfer Credit Coordinator (transfer_credit@sfu.ca) or the ISS Exchange Credit Team (excredit@sfu.ca). Requests will be reviewed by the admissions and curriculum offices, and the University Curriculum Office will contact the student to inform them once a decision has been made (see below for evaluation procedure).
Q and b designations
- Additionally, designation effective dates may come into play with assigned transfer of Q and B designations if the corresponding SFU course was designated after 2006 and after the time in which the student took the course (e.g. SFU KIN 110 B-Sci was not effective until Sept 2009 at SFU, therefore transfer courses taken prior to Sept 2009 that transfer to KIN 110 do not receive the designation).
- Courses articulating as unassigned transfer credit or GE credit will be reviewed by the admissions and curriculum offices upon request, please see the process below.
transfer for w designation
W designation is not automatic, even if a course articulates for assigned transfer credit and the SFU course is a W. The W will not appear on the student's transfer list unless the transfer course has already been approved as W. W designation is based on the way in which a course is taught, and the way in which writing assignments are used to teach the particular discipline, and therefore courses must be individually reviewed to determine if they meet the W criteria. Students wishing to have a course evaluated for W must be prepared to provide detailed material on course pedagogy and writing assignments, including contact information for course instructors.
requesting evaluation for wqb designation of a transfer course
1. Before submitting a request please be sure the course meets the criteria and descriptions listed above.
2. Students may apply for a WQB designation review of a transfer course by submitting a request to the UCIL Office (ucil_office@sfu.ca) along with the following information:
- A completed Application for WQB Designations for Transfer Courses
- It is possible to request more than one designation for a course (W, Q, and/or B), however, a course can only be used to meet one B-type requirement (B-Hum, B-Sci or B-Soc).
- Supporting documents (full course syllabus including course outlines, assignment lists, etc.)
Please note: incomplete applications will not be reviewed and will be returned to the student. Please ensure that your request is complete in order to prevent a delay.
3. Upon receipt of the request and supporting documentation, the UCIL Office will review the application to confirm WQB designation eligibility. Please note that this process may take up to three weeks.
4. The UCIL Office will communicate the decision to the Transfer Credit Coordinator or the ISS Exchange Credit Team, who will update the student's transcript.
5. The student will be notified by the UCIL Office once the decision has been finalized and the student’s record has been updated.