The Office of the Registrar is the sole authority responsible for evaluating student academic records to ensure all program completion and graduation requirements are met as approved by Education Council. This includes validating all courses completed, residency requirements, and minimum grades achieved.
Application for Graduation
Each diploma, certificate, and citation candidate must formally apply to graduate by completing the Request to Graduate form available on the NLC website. Apprentices completing one or more levels of technical training do not need to submit a form.
There is no deadline to apply to graduate; requests are processed year-round. You should be enrolled in your final semester or last 10 weeks of classes when you submit your graduation request.
Convocation ceremonies are held in late spring each year. If you think you will finish your program by August 31 and you want to attend Convocation ceremonies that year, you can submit your graduation request early, by April 30. If you submit your graduation request after that date, or if you will finish your program after August 31, you will be invited to Convocation ceremonies the following year. To learn more about Convocation, check out nlc.bc.ca/convocation.
Academic Transcripts
After official verification and after completion of the conferral process, the Registrar’s Office includes an official notation on all academic transcripts of graduated students that the credential has been awarded.
Parchments
Name on Parchments
Typically, the full legal name of the graduate will appear on the parchment. However, the College recognizes and supports that many members of its community may choose to use a first name other than their legal name to identify themselves. In such cases, a student may wish to have their ‘chosen’ first name on their parchment. Students are encouraged to carefully consider, as once conferred a credential cannot be altered.
However, the full legal name of the graduate will appear on the transcript.
Issuing of Parchments
All students who meet graduation requirements are issued one official NLC parchment.
Upon formal request, the Registrar’s Office will issue a replacement credential to a graduate whose name has changed or whose credential has been lost/destroyed.
The Duplicate/Replacement Parchment Request form may be used to order an official re-print of your parchment. Official re-prints look almost exactly like an original parchment, with a notation that says “Duplicate of original issued in month/year” in small print along the bottom front of the document.
Duplicate/replacement parchments are only issued for students who have successfully graduated from an NLC program and have previously been issued a parchment.
Northern Lights College reserves the right to withhold official records (including parchments) for students in arrears or with outstanding books or tools.
The Office of the Registrar will maintain a standard for parchments, including naming conventions, design, and signatures, ensuring consistency with commonly accepted practices. Parchment(s) will be issued only after all graduation requirements are met, the student has applied for graduation, and the graduation audit has been conducted and verified.