By Maria Isabel Cubillo
The lack of knowledge about eTranscript California can leave students unprepared, with high last -minute fees.
Students can save the $10 fee per paper transcript requests. In December 2012 Michelle Pilati, Academic Senate for California Community Colleges Vice President wrote an article titled “Making the Case for eTranscript California” in which she explains that eTranscript California allows all California Community Colleges to request, view and transmit academic transcripts via Internet with each other and participating California universities. eTranscript needs an awareness campaign at East Los Angeles College.
A transfer student must go to the transfer center and be told about eTranscript California or read word-for-word the web pages that the universities send via email to be aware of this money-saving option.
ELAC has used eTranscript California functions since May 28, 2013. The transfer center is seeking to bring more students through its doors and share with those students about eTranscript California.
The home page of eTranscript California says eTranscript California has supported the work of Student Success Act of 2012 (SB1456), AB1056, and the CCC Education Planning Initiative.
SB1456 goal is to ease the path to graduation and transfer. One of the ways it seeks to do that is by improving the service given by Student Services at each college.
Yet after five years the passing of SB1456, one essential benefit that Student Services can be giving to students transferring is being kept under the the radar. When students submit a paper transcript request, the transcript is sent to the designated school and the staff at the school needs to manually type in their information.
The opportunity for mistakes is inevitable. eTranscript removes human error. Pilati listed some benefits of using eTranscript California which include the more efficient use of college personnel, the reduction paper use, elimination of mistakes from students’ records and easier transition for students from one institution to another.
Paper transcript fraud can cease to exist if eTranscript California is completely implemented.
If student services fail to notify students about eTranscripts, students should look into it on their own.
Transfer Center Director Kirby Dominguez said Admissions in Student Services handles the processing of eTranscript California requests and would know more on the topic.
Dominguez said the three distinct student information systems are not uniformed within the Universities of California, California State Universities, and California Community Colleges.
The lack of uniformity adds to students not having all the benefits that eTranscript Cslifornia can give. He said California State University, Northridge is known to do it in the students’ favor.
They request the transcript from the community college. I had a different experience. I went in for an appointment with a pre-admissions counselor. When she walked me to the Admissions and Records, I was told that a paper transcript needed to be submitted for all community college courses and that ELAC had only sent my records from 2008 through 2014.
The experience was frustrating. “UC are a lot more in sync with their system, more uniformly.” Dominguez said.
The reason behind this is that there are nine campuses in contrast to 23 CSUs and 112 CCCs. Students take the short end of the stick when requesting transcripts from the Admissions Office.
A solution is to have a large poster with bold letters explaining the overview of eTranscript California on the door of Admissions. In the financial aid town hall meeting and workshops, eTranscript California needs to be flagged as a priority. Let’s share with others the knowledge of eTranscript California.
If you have more questions, speak with the Senior Admissions and Records Supervisor Anna Salazar.