If you are studying at a university in your country and want to continue your studies in Spain, we will explain the procedures and steps you must take and the options available to you.
Basic information before studying in Spain
- College students must pay fees and cover medical insurance, even in public universities.
- Financial aid in the form of scholarships They are granted depending on family income, and are conditioned by the record (in general, you will be required to pass all the subjects in which you enroll and enroll in a minimum of credits per year). It is not easy to maintain a scholarship in studies with many key subjects and the amounts of the scholarships do not cover all the student's expenses: books, food, accommodation if applicable, etc.
- It is possible that your country will have to issue you the official status of the degree that you have obtained through the Hague Apostille.
- You will be required to do the same as Spanish students, that is, your previous academic qualifications, whether they have been completed in Spain or not. They must be official, that is, be issued and corroborated by authorized centers.
- Once you obtain your university degree within the territory of the European Union, in principle it will have valid for the entire territory of the EU, although each country may request some special condition for validation. These conditions do not depend on your nationality, but on which university issued your degree and according to which study plan.
Previous steps to study in Spain
- Decide whether you want to continue your studies at a private or public university. If it is private, everything is easier, since in many cases the validations are accepted directly. The drawback is the price, since the cost of university is high.
- You must contact the host university about the suitability of the change. That is, receive an official response to know if it is feasible to validate the studies and the steps to take. This is very important, since each university has its own criteria.
Option 1. Continue university studies for subject recognition
In this case, the idea is to continue from where you left off in your home country. To do this, you will need to have your studies and courses from your home country validated. The goal is to equate your university credits between your home country and Spain. You should know that:
- Validation places are scarce. In some cases only 1% of vacant places are allocated.
- Priority is given to Spanish students who want to change their university degree and want partial or total validation of their university studies.
Sometimes you'll be required to take a bridging course that covers the parts of the syllabus not covered in the same depth at your initial university. When you enroll in a new program, some subjects will be automatically credited, while others won't. How is this decided? It's based on the syllabi of your new university and your old one, although in case of doubt, the professor responsible for making the final decision may influence the outcome. Keep in mind that, in Spain and throughout the European Union, degrees are broken down into subjects and credits or teaching hours, rather than courses as blocks. However, some degrees have core subjects: courses that prevent you from enrolling in higher-level courses until you've passed them. Core subjects are part of the national curriculum and vary depending on the specific degree program and university. They may not be the same if you're looking at two different universities, so we strongly recommend researching this in advance.
This link shows an example of the application process at the Complutense University of Madrid (UCM ), the university with the most students in Spain. As you can see, it's a simple process but with limited success (depending on the program, as we've mentioned). Therefore, you should consider other options if needed.
Option 2. Take the university entrance tests
In this case, the idea is to start from scratch with a Spanish degree program, leaving aside any previous studies. This is especially recommended if you haven't been studying at a university in your home country for very long. It's a simpler option, where everything begins with validating your high school diploma and preparing for the entrance exams. Another option is to take the university entrance exams for students over 25 and for migrants who apply.
The validation of your high school diploma is a simple but slow administrative process that can take around eight months to complete, although you are allowed to take exams while you wait for the decision. Depending on how recent your studies are from those years, it might be more advantageous to access university through an entrance exam.
Option 3. Take the university entrance tests and validation of studies
In this case it is about making a hybrid between option 1 and 2. It is about preparing the beginning of university in a simple way but at the same time requesting validation. In this way, one does not wait for a validation resolution that may not arrive or, if it is finally granted, having used that time to obtain a leveling and review basic topics.
Option 4. Access a private university
In this case, as we mentioned in the introduction, things would be simpler, since most private universities offer almost full credit transfer for completed studies. It will depend on the university and degree program, but it shouldn't be too difficult. If this option is of interest to you, we recommend contacting LegalSpain , a company that specializes in advising on these processes with private universities.
Conclusion
The first thing is to contact the university to find out the requirements. Once this is known, decide whether to consider starting where you left off (option 1), starting as just another student (option 2), doing the hybrid option which, although being the most optimal, is the one that involves the most work (option 3) or the ease of private university paying more money (option 4).
Talk to professors at the center where you are going to continue your studies and with compatriots who come from your same career and have already gone through the process to guide you, but keep in mind that recent changes in legislation mean that what was useful two years ago is today. obsolete. If you must start your studies immediately so as not to miss the entire course or if you don't even know where to start, contact with Escuela PCE. We work every day with students from Latin America in the same situation as you and we are aware of how much the process can vary from one student to another, depending on the course and university of departure. We hope to have resolved your doubts about how to validate university studies in Spain.
