Visiting
graduate students
Students who have been admitted to a master’s degree program in another accredited institution may enroll for up to 9 credits at SPU, with the approval of the program from which courses are to be taken.
To gain admission to Seattle Pacific as a visiting graduate student, you must submit the standard online graduate application and a letter from the dean’s office of your home institution stating that you are a student in good standing at that institution.
Non-matriculated students
In certain programs, qualified individuals who desire to take a particular 6000-level course or 7000-level — but are not planning to work toward a graduate degree or certificate — may register for the course. But this may happen only with the advance approval
of the director of graduate studies of the program from which the course is to be taken. Such students will be classified as graduate non-matriculated students. Permission to register as a non-matriculated graduate student is always on a space-available basis. Non-matriculated students may take no more than 6 credits of graduate coursework in a given quarter.
Non-matriculated international students who are non-native English speakers are required to submit an acceptable official English proficiency test score to Student Academic Services, and must pay for their courses at the time of registration. SPU considers an international student to be a native English speaker if both their primary and secondary education took place in Australia, Canada (other than Quebec), Great Britain, Ireland, New Zealand, or the U.S. (other than Puerto Rico). Non-matriculated international students also must complete required paperwork for the International Student Services Office prior to the start of the quarter in which they will take classes.
If a student who has completed SPU graduate credit as a non-matriculated student later applies and is accepted for admission to a graduate program, the credits earned in a course as a non-matriculated graduate student may be used to meet master’s
degree requirements only if:
- A grade of B or better was achieved in the course.
- The course was
taken within the three-year period prior to admission to the program.
Up to 12 credits, at the discretion of the program, taken before admission to a program, may be applied toward master’s degree requirements. It is vital to check with the program director to learn how many credits taken as a non-matriculated student apply to each particular degree.
For more information about policies governing non-matriculated students, see the Registration section of this catalog.