Validating studies done outside Puerto Rico

The Equivalency Studies Unit is attached to the Department of Education’s Auxiliary Secretariat for Integrated Services to the Student, the Family and the Community. It offers direct services to people wishing to validate academic studies done in the United States and other countries who want to seek admission to Puerto Rico’s education system or labour market. Besides validation, it refers students for placement or equivalency examinations under Act 217, authorises provisional enrolment, gives individual guidance to homeschooling students, receives and checks transcripts of non-graduate and homeschooling students through the Student Record Exchange System (SRX) platform, and liaises with universities, with United States Citizenship and Immigration Services in Puerto Rico, with embassies and with other countries’ Departments of Education.

It applies to anyone who completed academic studies in the United States or other countries and wants to enter Puerto Rico’s education system or labour market. The Unit lists concrete scenarios: students arriving who want to enter public or private schools; people seeking admission to Puerto Rico’s public and private universities; homeschooling students wanting to enter the public system; students from abroad and from the United States who left their studies and wish to continue and finish them; and people wanting to join the Armed Forces, the Puerto Rico Police, or campuses of the Instituto Tecnológico de Puerto Rico.

• Having done the studies in the United States or another country, and wanting to enter Puerto Rico’s education system or labour market.Verified against the official source
• The credit transcripts to be validated. For non-graduate and homeschooling students, the Unit receives, checks, analyses and validates them through the Student Record Exchange System (SRX) platform.Verified against the official source

• The Department does not publish a document list on this page, nor whether an apostille or official translation is needed. Confirm with the Unit before gathering anything, especially if the documents come from another country.

1. 1

   Step 1: Identify which of the services is yours

   The Unit does several different things and arriving knowing which you are asking for saves the first visit. Validation for university admission; validation of transcripts to continue in a public or private school; referral to placement or equivalency examinations under Act 217; authorisation of provisional enrolment; individual guidance for homeschooling; and evaluation of records for joining the Armed Forces, the Police or the Instituto Tecnológico.

2. 2

   Step 2: If the school year has started, ask about provisional enrolment

   It is the service that solves the immediate problem. The Unit authorises provisional enrolment for students arriving from the United States or other countries who wish to enter public or private schools. In other words: the child does not have to wait at home for the validation to finish. Ask for it by name.

3. 3

   Step 3: Gather the transcripts before you move, if you can

   Getting an academic record from another jurisdiction once you are already here is the slow part. The Unit receives, checks, analyses and validates transcripts, and for non-graduate and homeschooling students it does so through the SRX platform. The Department does not publish on that page whether an apostille or translation is needed, so ask before ordering anything: those are errands that cost money and time.

4. 4

   Step 4: If you come from homeschooling, there is a named route

   The Unit offers individual guidance for homeschooling students interested in entering the public system, and evaluates students coming from homeschooling. It is not an odd case you have to explain from scratch: it is a service the Unit already lists.

5. 5

   Step 5: If an exam applies, it is under Act 217

   The Unit refers students for placement or equivalency examinations under Act 217, arriving from the United States or other countries. What that exam involves and when it is offered does not appear on that page, so ask at the same time you hand in the record.

Before the Department of Education’s Equivalency Studies Unit, attached to the Auxiliary Secretariat for Integrated Services to the Student, the Family and the Community. The Department does not publish a direct phone number or email for the Unit on that page; the Department’s general directory is at de.pr.gov/directorio.

• Keeping the student out of school waiting for the validation, when provisional enrolment exists.
• Ordering apostilles or translations without first confirming they are needed.
• Arriving without the transcripts, which are the slow thing to obtain from another jurisdiction.
• Believing a homeschooling student has no route: the Unit expressly lists one.
• Confusing validation with admission: the university may have its own process.
• Not asking about the Act 217 placement or equivalency examinations when they apply.

These are the government pages this guide is based on.

• Departamento de Educación de Puerto Rico

  Educación

  de.pr.gov

• Department of Education — enrolment

  Departamento de Educación

  de.pr.gov