Including list of course descriptions in addition to transcripts - common?

[Vader Was Framed]

My transcript from my masters degree doesn't exactly give the reader too much indication of the courses I took. Long story short, several courses were bucketed under a "Special Problems/Directed Studies" course listing, etc.

I figured it couldn't hurt to include in my application package an additional document with course listings of my undergraduate and graduate courses completed.

Is this common? Is this overkill? I feel without it, it is hard for any reviewer to decipher some courses by its title/listing (esp. my grad as mentioned).

For undergrad, I figured I'd categorize the courses taken by discipline/relevance instead of a giant dump of courses.

Related question - has anyone ever heard of revising a transcript to address this? Not sure if I'd want to go down that path..

Any thoughts are welcome!

Cheers.

[njzyh2201]

Hi,

I think I also want to ask the same question.

UP UP

[fuzzylogician]

1. Yes, some schools require an addendum to the transcript specifying information such as (1) course, (2) instructor, (3) material covered, (4) textbook (if any) - especially if this is not clear from the transcript itself. I wrote such a document as supplemental information for schools that allowed it, and also explained what paper I wrote for each class (topic, grade) and what my final grade was - so this document contained all the information the transcript did plus additional details. This is not terribly common, but it's also not unheard of. As long as your schools allow you to submit additional documents on top of the required ones, it can't hurt to submit such a document. Just make sure you're allowed to submit supporting docs - some schools are strict about not wanting to see any not-required docs and could get upset if you submit something against the rules.

2. Revising an official document in any way is a BAD idea. You can submit an addendum or explanations as necessary, but don't mess with the document itself.

[1Q84]

As is usually the case, asking the grad secretary is usually your best option.

I asked a couple schools and they said sure. Either submitting an attachment with a list of the courses in question and an official course description from the school calendar will do. Some apps have a field for that and some ask for a separate sheet.

I also talked to my undergrad school's transcript centre and they have a service where they cross reference courses and photocopy a course description from the school calendar of that year for free and send it along with the transcript. See if you can do that.

[Vader Was Framed]

Great points all, especially about saving some cash on using .pdfs of unofficial transcripts until actual acceptance to a program (for those programs that detail this).

I think I'll plan on including a supplemental doc with course descriptions as long as a program does not explicitly state you can only upload/submit certain documents.

I feel without it, those reviewing the actual transcipt would not have much information about many of my key grad courses.