Transfer Policy

Statement of Transfer Practice
This policy statement is intended to serve as a guide for dealing with transfer, acceptance, and award of credit. “Transfer” as used here refers to the movement of students from one college, university, or other education provider to another and to the process by which credits representing educational experiences, courses, degrees, or credentials that are awarded by an education provider are accepted or not accepted by Malone University.

Inter-Institutional Transfer of Credit
Transfer of credit from one institution to Malone University involves at least three considerations:

1. the educational quality of the learning experience which the student transfers;
2. the comparability of the nature, content, and level of the learning experience to that offered by the receiving institution; and
3. the appropriateness and applicability of the learning experience to the programs offered by the receiving institution, in light of the student’s educational goals.

Accredited Institutions
Accreditation speaks primarily to the first of these considerations, serving as the basic indicator that an institution meets certain minimum standards. Here at Malone, careful attention to the accreditation conferred by accrediting bodies recognized by the Council for Higher Education Accreditation (CHEA) is used to determine the initial transferability of academic credit. CHEA has a formal process of recognition which requires that all accrediting bodies so recognized must meet the same standards. Under these standards, CHEA has recognized a number of accrediting bodies, including:

1. regional accrediting commissions (which historically accredited the more traditional colleges and universities but which now accredit proprietary, vocational-technical, distance learning providers, and single-purpose institutions as well);
2. national accrediting bodies that accredit various kinds of specialized institutions, including distance learning providers and freestanding professional schools; and
3. professional organizations that accredit programs within multipurpose institutions.

Although accrediting agencies vary in the ways they are organized and in their statements of scope and mission, all accrediting bodies that meet CHEA’s standards for recognition function to ensure that the institutions or programs they accredit have met generally accepted minimum standards for accreditation.

Accreditation speaks to the probability, but does not guarantee, that students have met acceptable standards of educational accomplishment and thus allows Malone University to accept in transfer academic credit that meets our institutional transfer standard toward university programs.

Comparability and Applicability
Comparability of the nature, content, and level of transfer credit and the appropriateness and applicability of the credit earned with programs offered by Malone, are as important in the evaluation process as the accreditation status of the institution at which the transfer credit is awarded. For those programs that do not hold a recognized status with CHEA, Malone University should have reasonable confidence that students from other institutions are qualified to undertake our educational program. It is through the articulation and transfer policies established by Malone that it determines the existence of valid evaluation measures, including third-party expert review to institutional effectiveness. Therefore, professional institutions in good standing with a State or National accreditation/licensure that are in line with programs or degrees offered at Malone, will be reviewed for transfer toward that program based on existing institutional credit transfers practices.

An example of this alternate comparability/applicability review: A student requesting to transfer academic credit from an institution that does not hold a CHEA recognized accreditation, but is recognized as in good standing with the Ohio Board of Nursing (OBN) and/or National League of Nursing (NLN), may have credits reviewed and transferred toward completion of the BSN degree at Malone University. Individual courses still must meet institutional and department standards, but the lack of a recognized CHEA accrediting body will not impede the review for transfer. The good standing of each institution will be evaluated annually to affirm an ongoing transfer of academic credit.

This review will be available for other programs that may hold third-party professional licensing as part of their professional practices.

The review process for these professional institutions requires that the Provost, Registrar, Vice President for Enrollment Management, Dean of School (from academic program where transfer of credit is sought), and Department Chair/Program Director (from academic program where transfer credit is sought) meet to evaluate the following information being presented: appropriate materials documenting the transferring student’s academic courses, the program’s academic content, and all external state and/or federal licensing or accrediting status of the issuing institution. Once approval is granted, the status of the approval is subject to annual review to assure Malone that the issuing institution is maintaining its approved status through external agencies.

Foreign Institutions
In most cases, foreign institutions are chartered and authorized to grant degrees by their national governments, usually through a Ministry of Education or similar appropriate ministerial body. No other nation has a system comparable with voluntary accreditation as it exists in the United States. Therefore, all foreign credentials and/or transcripts will be evaluated through the evaluation services approved/recommended by Malone University.

Institutional Transfer Credit Practice - Student Records
Every effort is made to correlate the work previously completed with the requirements for a degree from Malone. Transfer students must provide the official transcript from each institution attended beyond high school. These records become the property of Malone University and are considered a part of the student’s official file. Failure to report prior college or university attendance (including early admission) or to furnish official transcript(s) cancels all enrollment privileges.

1. Transfer credit evaluation is tentative until official transcripts are received directly from the issuing institution and the evaluation is finalized through review of the official document(s).
2. No student will be permitted to enroll until all official transcripts have been received. (Petitions for exceptions may be made to the Director of Admissions where delays are unavoidable due to transfers between semesters.)
3. For students who transfer to Malone not having completed the AA, AS, BA, or BS degree, the average grade in courses allowed for transfer from each school must be 2.0 or higher (on a 4.0 scale). This means that for every grade of “D” accepted there must be another grade of at least “B” for an equal number of credits. Grades of “D-” and lower are not transferable. Students who have completed the degrees listed above will not be subject to the grade specific course requirements listed above for the transfer of courses applied to their General Education program and will be viewed as having completed GE requirements with the exception of Malone Foundational Courses (BIBL 100, THEO 211, and GEN 460). Malone Foundational Courses will be evaluated for all incoming students based on courses completed. 
4. Courses accepted in transfer will be recorded with the course number, title, and credit value; no grade point value will appear on the record and no grade point average will be calculated for the coursework listed. However, the grade point average for all coursework in the major (including transfer courses) will be calculated. The grade point average of all college or university work attempted will be used to determine graduation honors. (For further clarification, see Graduation Honors.)
5. To graduate, a student must complete at least 30 graded semester hours at Malone University. These 30 semester hours cannot in any part include credit for extra-collegiate experiential learning or credit by examination. No rigid standard exists for the number of credits that can be transferred from regionally accredited two-year colleges, Bible colleges, liberal arts colleges, etc. The number of hours allowable may be different in each case, as determined by five variable considerations: (1) the kinds of courses presented; (2) the grades earned in each course; (3) the course of study pursued at Malone University; (4) the credit recommendations of the publication, “Transfer Credit Practices of Designated Educational Institutions” (pub., AACRAO) and the Council for Higher Education Accreditation (CHEA); and (5) articulations and approved transfer practices for professional/licensure organizations approved through the review process outlined in the Statement of Transfer Practice.