Credits F.A.Q.

Is requesting credits required?
No, every student has the right to request credits, as well as the right to complete all of the courses offered in his year if he so chooses. In fact, we often recommend complete course enrollment for those students who have difficulty with Italian comprehension.

What do I need to do in order to obtain credit?
You must submit all the documents that verify your educational degrees, your important work, school, musical or language learning experiences (we call these self-education experiences) to the school secretary. The possession of a degree may enable a student to bypass general high school subjects like Italian, history, English, mathematics, law, science, etc, and in some cases even special subjects like woodwork, design, musical culture, etc. IMPORTANT: Complete documentation of the experience facilitates the recognition of credits. For Italian degrees, not only earned complete degrees (vocational qualification, State Exam certificates, etc), but also single years of completed schoolwork will be accepted for review. It is important to submit your grades in the form of a transcript, either a yearly or final assessment of your scholarly success, or proof of having passed the university exams. Those in possession of a university degree must also submit their high school diplomas and relevant documentation. For foreign degrees, the documents must be accompanied by a translation from the national consulate or from an authorized translator. Not only degrees but also the most important evaluations and grades must be submitted and translated.

Who issues the credits and when?
A committee composed of teachers from the school reviews the requests and the submitted documents, evaluates the compatibility of the students’ experiences with those at the Violin Making School, and makes a decision in the first week of October.

How does it work?
The teachers on the credit committee either issue credit immediately, based on the provided documents, or they request further information from the applicants. They may also ask that the students take an additional placement test, written or oral, which is required in the case of insufficient documents and regarding personal self-educative experiences. The fourth and fifth year students must always provide additional proof that their skills are advanced enough to start at that level.

What happens after the issue of credit?
In the presence of a transcript containing a year’s grades, an Italian student will receive credit in the requested subjects unless otherwise determined by the committee. In the absence of a transcript or non-Italian evaluation document, the student will receive a passing grade for the requested subjects, which the student will have the opportunity to raise by submitting a transcript, degree, and/or taking a subject test, completing an additional assignment or working in another way with a teacher of that subject at the school. This is important especially for students who wish to take the exam to pass directly from the first to the third year.

If I receive credit in a subject, I don’t have to attend that class?
Yes, once you have received total credit. However, if the credit is partial, the student must be partially active in the course, whether for certain tests, at certain times of year, certain days of the week, or certain specific lessons, in order to enhance his or her understanding of the subject or to study useful skills or topics with which he or she may not be familiar. Class attendance helps to improve a student’s grade, but may also hurt his or her grade if he or she does not attend.

What do I do in the hours I gain by not attending a class in which I have credit?
Credits enable a student to construct his or her own personalized path of study, so he or she can attend other classes, such as laboratory, or attend other school activities, like the orchestra. Students are able to begin their personal study programs at the end of October.