First-Year Writing Program Transfer Credit Guidelines
Students transferring college level composition course credit or an associate or undergraduate degree from another institution may partially or fully satisfy the first-year writing requirement.
Students can search NC State’s Transfer Course Equivalency database to see if courses taken are transferable. On the database homepage, select the Courses Taken at Other Institutions to search.
Read through the common scenarios for transferring credit to determine if additional coursework is needed to fulfill the first-year writing requirement. Contact Ashley Everette, andaught@ncsu.edu,
First-Year Writing Associate Director, with questions not answered below.
If you have an Associates of Arts or Sciences degree from a North Carolina Community College, then you are exempt from the first-year writing requirement. You will need to submit proof of your degree to Ashley Everette to verify and process the exemption.
Although you will not be awarded credit hours toward your degree audit, the first-year writing requirement will be waived upon verification of documentation. Other English coursework transferred to NC State may count as a free elective or additional credits.
If you have a Bachelor of Arts or Sciences Degree from an accredited U.S. College or University, then you are exempt from the first-year writing requirement. You will need to submit proof of your degree to Ashley Everette to verify and process the exemption.
Although you will not be awarded credit hours toward your degree audit, the first-year writing requirement will be waived upon verification of documentation. Other English coursework transferred to NC State may count as a free elective or additional credits.
If you completed a sequence of two college composition courses and received 6-credit hours, then you will likely receive credit for ENG 101, which fully satisfies the first-year writing requirement. Also, you will receive free elective or additional credit for the remaining 2-credit hours.
If you completed a college composition course and received 4-credit hours, then you will likely receive credit for ENG 101, which fully satisfies the first-year writing requirement. However, some composition courses may transfer as elective credit instead of credit for ENG 101. Check the NC State Equivalency Database to verify.
If you completed the first course of a two college composition course sequence and received 3-credit hours, then you will likely receive partial credit toward your first-year writing requirement. You can either enroll in either ENG 202, an advanced composition course, or ENG 101 to fully satisfy the first-year writing requirement.
If you placed out of the first course of a two college composition course sequence, completed the second course and received 3-credit hours, you will likely still receive partial credit toward your first-year writing requirement and may be eligible to request a waiver for the outstanding credit hour. You will need to submit proper documentation to Ashley Everette to verify and process the waiver.
A waiver of the remaining hour for the first-year writing requirement, if granted, does not provide any additional hours of college credit. You should consult your academic advisor if you have questions about the implications of a waiver for your course planning and graduation.
If you placed out of the first-year writing requirement at your previous institution, earning no transferable credit, you will need to enroll in the appropriate course based on the first-year writing placement guidelines.
If you want to satisfy NC State’s first-year writing requirement at another institution, then you should consult NC State’s Transfer Course Equivalency database to ensure transferability of coursework. Note that in most cases you will need to complete two 3-credit hour college composition courses (equates to 6-credit hours) in order to satisfy the first-year writing requirement.