FAQs - Academic Credentials Evaluation

There are clearly two distinct meanings to the word “accredited” as it relates to the evaluation of your credentials with the Illinois Board of Examiners.   The primary meaning of accredited means that a college or university is accredited by a regional accrediting body and for credit to be recognized by the Board of Examiners, a college or university must be regionally accredited.

The second meaning of accredited refers to accreditation by either the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business (AACSB) or the Accreditation Council for Business Schools and Programs (ACBSP).  If your graduate program is accredited by either of these two accrediting bodies, additional credit will be counted for each semester hour of accounting coursework.

An earned degree does NOT substitute for verification of the 150 hours.  We must compute the total hours earned one course at a time.

Yes, in order to be considered official, all academic records/transcripts must bear a seal, and a signature, in ink, of an authorized official of the institution (such as the Registrar or Recorder of Records). Official documents must be provided from the institution awarding the degree. A photocopy, fax, email, or notarized document is not considered an official document and will not be evaluated.

No, we do our own evaluations based on the original documents and our own standards and polices. A credential evaluation service applies judgments and interpretations based on their own particular standards and polices.  An educational institution (college or university) also awards transfer credit based on their own standards and policies.

No, documents issued in languages other than English, must be accompanied by a certified word-for-word translation into English. In order to qualify as certified, translations must be provided by the issuing educational institution, showing official letterhead, stamps, seals, signatures, etc. or they can be provided by a professional agency. A translation performed by a member of American Translators Association (ATA) is acceptable. An acceptable one for Canada is Association of Translators and Interpreters of Ontario (ATIO).

We accept hours if they are accepted by the institution.  We also accept graded course work of A, B, C, or D that has been awarded “earned” by the institution.

On the back of the transcript an explanation is given of how hours are computed, and how to do the conversion to semester hours if needed.

The limitation of six hours of internship or life-experience credit toward meeting the accounting requirement refers to credit earned outside the usual classroom venue that is posted on a transcript.  If a candidate has attended a college that awards credit based on evaluation of work and life experience, accounting credits from that evaluation process are limited to six semester hours.  The same applies to accounting internships.

Yes, as long as they are posted on the transcript where the course work was taken.

We do not award credit for repeated or duplicated classes.  Repeated classes are those taken more than once at the same institution.  Duplicated classes are courses similar in content and level taken at two different institutions; if you complete Principles of Taxation at Northern Illinois University and take the course again at University of Iowa, we will not award/count the credit hours twice.  The policy of the institutions awarding the credit does not supersede the Board’s policy regarding duplicate courses.  The only exceptions to the repeated course rule are courses with the same prefix and title that are allowed by the institution for repeat credit and it is clearly stated as policy in their course catalogue.