Translation of Education Documents for Belgium

The region first, the document second

When education documents are recognised in Belgium, the first question is not “which university” but “which community”. If you are applying in the Flemish Region your counterpart is NARIC Vlaanderen; in the French-speaking region it is the recognition unit within the Fédération Wallonie-Bruxelles. These two structures work separately, and a decision obtained from one is not automatically valid at the other. The set of documents may look alike, but the language of the file differs: Dutch is expected on the Flemish side, French on the Walloon side. A file sent to the wrong region in the wrong language is not even taken up for assessment.

Brussels is bilingual, so there it is the institution’s own preference that decides. For the small German-speaking community there is a separate practice again. Before you begin your preparation for Belgium, then, establishing which community your target institution belongs to determines everything you do afterwards.

Why each document is asked for

The diploma evidences the degree; but Belgian recognition units take a particular interest in the length of the programme and its academic load, and that is read from the academic transcript. On undergraduate applications the school leaving certificate and the examination documents attached to it are asked for in order to show that the right of entry to university existed in the country of origin as well. Course descriptions are sought so that content can be compared on programmes leading to regulated professions. The language certificate is a separate checkpoint, because the language of instruction varies from region to region.

Region	Language of the file	Recognition counterpart
Flemish Region	Dutch	NARIC Vlaanderen
Wallonia	French	Fédération Wallonie-Bruxelles
Brussels	Varies by institution	The community the institution belongs to

What turns a file away

By some distance the most common ground for refusal in Belgium is a mismatch of language: a French translation sent to the Flemish Region, or a Dutch one to Wallonia. That is not a technical shortcoming but a straightforward procedural error, and the file is refused outright. Second comes the translation not having been done by a translator sworn before the court. Third, on undergraduate applications, failing to put the entrance examination result document alongside the school leaving certificate causes difficulty; without it the right of entry cannot be shown.

At what stage translation comes in

The order runs like this: the target community and language are settled, the original documents are gathered, the certification step is completed in Türkiye, and then the whole text, certification annotation included, is translated into the target language. Leave the translation until last and no work has to be repeated. The sworn translator’s translation is bound to the source document and sealed. You will find the levels of approval document by document in our document guide, and the differences between countries in our country list.

Using one file in two regions at once

Applying to more than one university in Belgium usually means applying to more than one language region. A candidate applying to Leuven and Liège at the same time is, technically speaking, preparing two separate files. Realising this late is costly; starting a second round of translation in the middle of the application season puts real strain on the timetable. The right approach is to draw up your list of targets at the outset and note, one by one, which institution expects which language. The number of documents may stay the same, yet this single decision can double the volume of translation.

Programmes taught in English soften the picture a little. Belgium has programmes teaching in English, at postgraduate level in particular, and on those the academic application can be made with English documents. The recognition application and the residence step, however, revert to the official language of the region. English, in other words, covers only part of the process rather than the whole of it, and knowing that distinction from the start prevents unnecessary surprises.

• List the community that each of your target institutions belongs to.
• Ask separately about the language of the academic application and of the recognition application.
• Plan for the local language at the administrative stage even on English-taught programmes.
• Keep the shared terminology the same across all the languages.

Another practical matter in Belgium is that the recognition application carries a fee and is assessed file by file; each application is judged on its own paperwork. Sending an incomplete file therefore costs not only time but an extra administrative round. Obtaining the list of required documents from the relevant unit before you open the application, and submitting the file complete, is the most realistic way of finishing the process in a single round.

The physical form of the documents matters too. The sworn translator’s translation is submitted bound to the source document and sealed; if that unity is broken, the paperwork loses its validity. If you are going to use the same document at more than one institution, you need more than one bound copy prepared. Working that out at the start is far quicker than going back to the translator during the enrolment period.

Finally, for candidates who are about to graduate there is the option of a provisional document. A letter of graduation obtained from the university before the diploma is printed is accepted provisionally by many institutions and allows the application to be opened; the diploma follows later.

In a bilingual country, translating into the wrong language is the most expensive mistake there is. Let us settle together which language yours should go into: look at our pricing page, or upload your documents and ask for a quotation.

This page is intended as guidance; the approval regimes of individual countries and the form in which documents are required can be updated over time. Where you are in doubt, it is best to put the question to the institution before you apply.