<p>I am applying for this fall to a graduate program for educational leadership at a large research university in the Midwest. I have a bachelor's degree in English, an MFA in creative writing and 1.5 years toward a doctorate in rhetoric (before I left to start a family). I have decided that rather than pursue rhetoric I want to do the MS in Ed, but am struggling with the application. </p>
<p>Between the Masters and PhD programs I took two ed courses (undergrad level) at another college, and, dealing with severe depression, didn't drop the courses in time, thus earning F's in both. With counseling things are much better now. </p>
<p>I'm wondering if I even need to include those transcripts as they in no way reflect the undergrad, or grad work I have done before or since? Also, as they were out of sequence, I was told by an admissions person I did not need to include coursework of this type. Can anyone set me straight?</p>
<p>When you apply for admission to any accredited college or university in the US, you are obliged to provide official copies of transcripts from every accredited college or university in the US that you have previously attended. The transcripts have to be in your file because the next time that the institution you are attending (or have graduated from) is up for renewal of accreditation your file just might be the one that the committee pulls up to look at. Missing documents means that the institution will be threatened with loss of accreditation. In other words, transcripts that aren’t related to a potential course of study aren’t pertinent to your admissibility in that course of study, but are really, truly pertinent to the people who keep the files in the registrar’s office.</p>
<p>How do I know this? I was almost kicked out of a graduate program when the registrar’s office did a routine review of the files and determined that I was missing a thirty year old (yes indeed, 30 as in the whole number after 29 and before 31) transcript.</p>
<p>The school does not mention any kind of addendum–a statement that might mitigate against the affects of potentially harmful information, like failing a course (in education, no less) in the couple of years prior to my application to a degree in educational leadership. Whether they ask for it or not, it sounds like it would be advisable to send such a statement.</p>
<p>In your case, I definitely would recommend including a note about these grades. They will want to know what went wrong. For ideas on handling it, why don’t you ask for some ideas at the graduate student forum? Click on “Discussion Home” in the upper left of this screen and scroll down to find it. The folks at the Parents forum might have good advice too.</p>