As Runaway Success of 'Slumdog Millionaire' Spotlights Indian Smarts, American Degree Evaluator Urges Acceptance of Indian Three-Year Bachelor Degrees

Ferndale, WA (PRWEB) February 5, 2009

The story of Mumbai orphan and slum resident Jamal Malik's improbable quiz-show success is charming audiences and critics around the world. But according Sheila Danzig, who heads a foreign credential evaluation agency, Career Consulting International (http://www.TheDegreePeople.com)], India should be better recognized for its excellent system of education, not its slums. "The film shows that intelligent minds can be cultivated anywhere, yet many graduates of India's rigorous educational system have trouble getting their degrees recognized in the United States," Danzig says.

Whereas a graduate from the U.K. with a three-year bachelor's degree has little trouble having it accepted in the U.S. as equivalent to an American bachelor's degree, someone with a three-year bachelor's degree from India faces an uphill battle getting American graduate schools to accept his degree as equivalent to an American bachelor's degree - even though the Indian educational system is closely modeled on that of the U.K.

Indeed, a 2005 study by Sheila Danzig and John Kersey, President of Marquess Educational Consultants Limited, concluded that the Indian and British educational systems are materially equivalent. Their conclusion: "If the value of your degree is not to depend on the color of your skin, the Indian three-year bachelor's degree must be accorded its proper value as an international credential."

"When we started including this study with our evaluations as well as expanding the evaluation itself to make the matter very clear, the rate of acceptance of Indian three-year degrees increased dramatically," says Danzig, whose company evaluates international educational credentials. "When the arguments are laid out objectively, people understand the inequity and are open to a proper equivalency. But prejudices continue to pose a challenge for many Indian graduates."

"This has a serious impact on people's ability to immigrate, get higher education and obtain employment," adds Kersey, who is president of a British educational consultancy firm with particular interests in international credential evaluation. "We are very proud of what we are doing to right this wrong."

The study, "Does the Value of Your Degree Depend on the Color of Your Skin?," appears at http://degree.com/articles/3-year-indian-degree.html.

For information on evaluations of educational credentials from around the world for U.S. immigration purposes, university admissions or employment, visit http://www.TheDegreePeople.com.

Contact: Sheila Danzig, 954.445.0107

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