An Angolan Transcript Issued as Three Per-Year Grade Declarations

What We Received

A client submitted three Angolan 'Declaração de Estudo' (Study Declaration) pages issued by the Instituto Politécnico Privado Graças a Deus, operating under the Cabinda Technical Health Institute of the Cabinda Provincial Health Secretariat, Government of Cabinda Province. Each page covered one academic year of a Técnico de Nutrição e Dietética program — 2022/2023 (10ª Classe), 2023/2024 (11ª Classe), and 2024/2025 (12ª Classe) — and was a complete one-page declaration with its own letterhead, body, grade table, and signature block, not a fragment of a larger transcript.

On every page the grade table had three columns — 'Disciplinas' (subjects), 'Notas' (grade), and 'Valores' (in words) — and every grade on the Angolan 0–20 scale was printed twice, once as a digit ('16') and once spelled out in Portuguese ('Dezasseis'). The class designation read 'Turma: Única.' The certified [Portuguese translation](/languages/portuguese) was needed for a U.S. credential evaluation and a USCIS filing.

How We Handled It

We delivered one bundled certified translation containing all three per-year declarations as separate pages, with the same layout each — letterhead, body paragraph, grade table, closing block, signature block — so the per-year boundary the school chose remained visible. Every grade was rendered twice: the digit unchanged, and the spelled-out Portuguese number translated into its English-word equivalent in parentheses (Dezasseis → Sixteen, Quinze → Fifteen, and so on across the 0–20 range), so the dual format the original uses survives in English.

'Turma: Única' was retained verbatim — Portuguese in, Portuguese out — and a Translator's Note explained that 'Única' is the literal name of the section in this school's organisation, not a description of how many sections existed in that academic year. The school's name 'Graças a Deus' was kept as a proper noun (not translated as 'Thanks to God'), and the chain of issuing authorities (Republic of Angola → Government of Cabinda Province → Cabinda Provincial Health Secretariat → Cabinda Technical Health Institute → Graças a Deus Private Polytechnic Institute) was preserved in the letterhead in full.

The circular wet stamp on pages 2 and 3, which partially overlaps the Director's signature, was described in brackets in line with our [stamps-fully-translated practice for USCIS submissions](/accepted-by/uscis): 'CABINDA · R.A.' along the lower arc was transcribed exactly, the central coat-of-arms graphic was identified, and the obscured portions were marked partially illegible. The Director's signatures, which are stylized handwriting and not legible as a name, were marked '[Illegible signature]' under the printed name 'Madalena de Fátima Muila Ngimbi' — never with the bare '[Signature]' marker that leaves a reader unsure whether the translator could read it.

Expert Note

"The original record was issued as three separate one-page Declarações de Estudo, one for each academic year of the program (10ª Classe / 2022–2023, 11ª Classe / 2023–2024, 12ª Classe / 2024–2025), rather than as a single consolidated transcript. The three pages have been delivered in this translation in chronological order, with each page mirroring the layout of its source. Every grade is rendered on the original Angolan/Portuguese 0–20 scale, in the dual form used by the issuer — digit followed by the spelled-out word in parentheses (e.g., '16 (Sixteen)') — to preserve the source's anti-tampering format. No GPA, percentage, or U.S. letter-grade conversion has been applied; equivalency determinations are the credential evaluator's responsibility, not the translator's. The class designation 'Turma: Única' has been retained in Portuguese as it is the section's literal name within the school's organisation, not a description."

Natalia VegaIberian & Latin American Legal Translator

Two further Translator's Notes documented the standard DD de Mês de YYYY → Month DD, YYYY date conversion, and identified the partially obscured circular stamp on pages 2 and 3 as the issuing office's wet seal with only its lower-arc text and central coat-of-arms clearly visible.

The Outcome

The certified translation was delivered as a single bundle containing all three per-year Declarações de Estudo with identical layout, every grade rendered twice in the original 0–20 dual form ('16 (Sixteen)'), 'Turma: Única' retained as the section name, and the partially obscured Cabinda wet stamp on pages 2 and 3 fully described. The Translator's Notes documented the per-year format, the dual-grade convention, and the explicit non-application of any GPA or letter-grade conversion.

We apply the same approach on every Angolan and PALOP secondary-vocational record that arrives as per-year declarations rather than a consolidated transcript.