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HCOS to BCOS Transfer Request: Why is this necessary?

Rationale

The Ministry of Education expects that when a student is enrolled in courses in more than one school, the school that holds the majority of courses is designated as the school of record (SOR).

Sometimes, full-time HCOS students decide to enroll with another school before all of their HCOS coursework has been completed. This leaves them with one or more active courses with HCOS but they are full-time students with another institution. 

When a student moves from HCOS to another school of record, they officially become a cross-enrolled student with HCOS. BC Online School (BCOS) is the division of our school that facilitates and oversees cross-enrolled students. 

There are a number of reasons for this separation, but the main one has to do with how final marks are reported.  The student’s current School of Record  is responsible for reporting student final grades and credits to the Ministry of Education when a course is completed. If HCOS is not the School of Record when students finish coursework, we can no longer report on behalf of the student and must instead report those completed grades to the new official School of Record. The School of Record then has the responsibility of reporting those marks to appear on student transcripts. 

Our systems within HCOS are not designed to identify these final course marks that need different methods of reporting, hence the need to move students into our BCOS division when they are no longer HCOS enrolled students.

Moving your student from HCOS to BCOS ensures that any remaining courses that are completed are properly reported to the Ministry of Education to appear on your student transcript and are credited for graduation. 

Why BCOS?

  • BCOS is designed to communicate to other schools and it is assumed that a BCOS student is cross enrolled. 

    • This information is helpful to anyone working with a student - academic advisors, teachers, administrators, parents, and office staff. 

  • BCOS sends progress reports to the SOR so that the school course counsellor is updated on course progress.

  • BCOS has systems in place to regularly identify when students have completed course work and report those final grades as appropriate.

What Happens If I Ignore The Transfer Request?

Students will be given 10 business days from the date they are informed of transfer request to complete their application to BCOS

  • Failure to move to BCOS means you run the very real risk that your final marks and course credits will not be reported to the Ministry of Education (will not appear on a student transcript). This can delay the granting of your Dogwood Diploma
  • If HCOS reports as if they are the School of Record, we run the risk of overriding data from the official School of Record, affecting their ability to report and unintentionally causing considerable work for both school offices. 
  • When students transfer to a new school, there are specific documents that need to be transferred, as those are required to stay with students. Failure to indicate you are now cross-enrolled with BCOS could mean that those important documents don’t make their way to your new school as our team has not received notification of the student transfer.
    • These documents may include report cards, IEP Documents, Designation Documents, etc

How Will This Change Affect Me?

  • Really, there is very little difference on the student end of things. 
    • The format of the course and access will stay the same.
    • The course teachers stay the same.
    • Your course progress and work is not lost, you continue on where you left off.
    • Your login information stays the same. 

How do I know if I need to transfer to BCOS?

You only need to take these steps if contacted by your Grad Advisor. Your Grad Advisor will ask that you complete the BCOS application form and send you a link to the online form.

  • Please complete the BCOS application form using the link sent to you by your Grad Advisor. 
  • You do not need to call the BCOS office when you have completed the form. The form is automatically sent to the BCOS office and the staff there will complete the course transfer once the form has been received. 

When asked to select a course on page 5 of the form, please select “HCOS to BCOS transfer’ for your grade level.

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