Tier 1 visa, all US taught masters degrees are now 0 points on PB calculator

In which case, you (or anyone in your position) has a good case to complain about NARIC contradicting themselves.  The letter gives you points but the database doesn't, ergo there is a problem with the database.  It therefore is worth people writing to NARIC to make sure that the database is right about their qualification, and if more than two or three people find that NARIC alter their decision then it can and should be taken further.

this is good to know...this doesn't affect me directly right now since i have already been awarded my tier 1, but i will definitely be writing about my situation, as i hate to think about how this could affect renewal three years down the line were i to need to go that route again. 

here's what the database returns:

United States of America   

North Carolina   

Master's degree (Taught)   

University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill   

2 years or less than 3   

Arts / Humanities      

2006   

Points Awarded: 0

You are entering it into the database wrong.  You have a US research masters, per your post above.  If you enter it as Masters (Research), it will award you 35 points.

A UK Masters taught is also worth 35 points. 

So your letter is consistent, your US MASTERS RESEARCH is equivalent to a UK MASTERS TAUGHT -- both award 35 points.  But if you enter your degree as a US Taught -- you are implying something completely different -- thus zero points.

Right, thanks Sara.

In which case, back to not being excited at all, and assuming that a NARIC letter will simly support what the database says.



Vicky

Vicky, while UK NARIC writes the database, the database doesn't consider certain things which a NARIC letter would.  You have to provide both your degree and your transcripts for a NARIC letter.  It is very conceivable that database, being very black and white would be an different result then a manual process that looks at degree and the transcript.

In my spare time, I am trying to get some sort of official stuff rolling (as you may have noted from my posting in Advocacy), but for now, the best bet is to get the NARIC Letter if there is doubt about if the degree is equivilant.  If there is any doubt someone can spend the £65 and be sure.  How can someone disagree with the database until they have the NARIC Letter anyways?

I am sceptical, and I would rather see evidence that NARIC are prepared to put their hands up and say "yeah, we are wrong about your degree" before people spend time and money on doing this.

I know what is in a NARIC letter, we used to get them quite often before the Home Office database was live and we used to also have access to NARIC's own database.  But I just can't see that it is a good idea to get people to do this without any indication that it is worth it.

Maybe get someone to do it first and see.

Vicky

Thanks for the input, everyone! Based on what I'm hearing, it sounds like getting a UK NARIC Equivalence Letter stating that my MA is equivalent to a UK MA is key. Otherwise, there's no real way to "prove" MA w/ further specialization.

Regarding the database that is apparently not consistent with their scoring, how do I access this?

Does anyone know why an MD is considered a Bachelor's degree?

Vicky, while UK NARIC writes the database, the database doesn't consider certain things which a NARIC letter would.  You have to provide both your degree and your transcripts for a NARIC letter.  It is very conceivable that database, being very black and white would be an different result then a manual process that looks at degree and the transcript.

In my spare time, I am trying to get some sort of official stuff rolling (as you may have noted from my posting in Advocacy), but for now, the best bet is to get the NARIC Letter if there is doubt about if the degree is equivilant.  If there is any doubt someone can spend the £65 and be sure.  How can someone disagree with the database until they have the NARIC Letter anyways?

Just a couple of things, I did the NARIC letter for my degrees, and my US Masters (taught, since I did not do a thesis) was considered the equiv of a UK Masters (taught). Since I piled higher and deeper afterwards that does not really matter, but if you are going to do one degree you might as well get them all assessed. Also, while the letter was relatively straightforward, I had to fax them my transcripts. It did take a little while to process, something like a month for them to send the letter, and a week or so to receive it here in the states. Also there is an additional option to actually get a certificate of equivalence. Though I am not sure exactly what that does. That is another £23.00. I also seem to remember it was less than £65.00 for the letter, but I would have to go back and look.

You are entering it into the database wrong.  You have a US research masters, per your post above.  If you enter it as Masters (Research), it will award you 35 points.

A UK Masters taught is also worth 35 points. 

So your letter is consistent, your US MASTERS RESEARCH is equivalent to a UK MASTERS TAUGHT -- both award 35 points.  But if you enter your degree as a US Taught -- you are implying something completely different -- thus zero points

This makes sense, except for the fact that NARIC evaluated my degree entirely wrong and the letter literally says they consider my degree to be a US taught master's (equivalent to a UK taught), so it seems like that is what one would have to pick with the letter stating that... hence the zero points in the database.  In this case, the database clearly does not match up with what the NARIC letter is saying. 

Does anyone know why an MD is considered a Bachelor's degree?

Could be because in the UK, medicine is an undergraduate degree, so you start training in medicine at age 18/19 and are qualified as a medical doctor by 24/25 without having to get a postgraduate degree as well. UK medical students usually graduate with an MBChB and an MBBS, which are equivalent to a US MD.

In the UK, an MD is a higher qualification than a straightforward US MD and is actually a equivalent to a PhD, concentrating on actual research in a medical field.

This Wiki page gives lots of info: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doctor_of_Medicine and you can aslo find a comparison of the US and UK medicine degrees here: http://www.hthtravelinsurance.com/travel_center/general/ne_el_21.cfm

This makes sense, except for the fact that NARIC evaluated my degree entirely wrong and the letter literally says they consider my degree to be a US taught master's (equivalent to a UK taught), so it seems like that is what one would have to pick with the letter stating that... hence the zero points in the database.  In this case, the database clearly does not match up with what the NARIC letter is saying. 

Fair enough but that isn't what you said initially.  People can only post advice based on what you write.

This makes sense, except for the fact that NARIC evaluated my degree entirely wrong and the letter literally says they consider my degree to be a US taught master's (equivalent to a UK taught), so it seems like that is what one would have to pick with the letter stating that... hence the zero points in the database.  In this case, the database clearly does not match up with what the NARIC letter is saying. 

Again, it doesn't matter what the database says, at least we don't think so.  If you didn't have the NARIC Letter the ECO would have to figure out what your degree is equivilent to using the database, but they don't know how to evaluate your transcript.  Where as the NARIC Letter, they assessed your transcript and deemed it an equivilant to a UK Masters and a UK Masters means you get the points.

Obviously this is something that is confusing and concerning and to Vicky, here is a good example that if you plug it into the database you get 0 points but the NARIC Letter says it counts...    If I am reading the poster right, it is what we were looking for right?

Fair enough but that isn't what you said initially.  People can only post advice based on what you write.

i suppose i wasn't clear enough, but what i was trying to get at is that part of the problem is with NARIC evaluating the degrees entirely wrong.  if they had said my degree was equivalent to a research degree rather than taught, there would be no confusion with the database to begin with.  luckily in this situation, it seems there is a way to claim the points if the database is ignored, but the larger problem is if they are not fully understanding the basic structure of my us degree, how can they be considered an authority on what it is equivalent to?  if they made a mistake with mine, then surely the cases where they are saying master's are equivalent to uk bachelor's could be argued against, as well. 

Also (and this may be out of the scope of this thread, for which I apologize in advance) the IB TOEFL score that UKBA requires is 110. The world record for IB TOEFL is 105!! This is like asking to have wings if one needs to qualify with a degree from a non English-speaking country. 

Now that is VERY interesting...


Vicky