When a Lebanese School Report Lists Disciplines in Both Arabic and French

What We Received

A client submitted a two-page <a href="/documents/transcripts">Lebanese school report (bulletin scolaire)</a> from Collège de La Sagesse, Section Saint-Jean, in Brasilia-Baabda. The pages covered two consecutive school years — 3ème B (the final year of collège, equivalent to 9th grade under the French system) and 2nde B (the first year of lycée, 10th grade) — with a full grade table on each page, a four-line council recommendation (Avis du conseil), a date, and the school's round Latin-motto stamp signed "La Direction."

The discipline table is what made the document distinctive. On both pages, roughly half of the rows were labeled in Arabic script — اللغة العربية (Arabic Language) with its three sub-components, plus تربية مدنية (Civic Education), تاريخ (History), and جغرافيا (Geography). The other half were labeled in French — FRANÇAIS, ENGLISH LANGUAGE, MATHEMATIQUES, PHYSIQUE, CHIMIE, SCIENCES DE LA VIE ET DE LA TERRE, and EDUCATION PHYSIQUE ET SPORTIVE. On the second page, History appeared twice in the table — once as تاريخ (coefficient 5) and again, separately, as HISTOIRE-GEOGRAPHIE (coefficient 4), reflecting the dual-curriculum structure of Lebanese francophone schooling.

How We Handled It

We translated every discipline into English and kept the Arabic original in square brackets immediately after each Arabic-script subject name — for example, "Arabic Language [اللغة العربية]," "Civic Education [تربية مدنية]," "History [تاريخ]," "Geography [جغرافيا]." The translation of the linguistic components followed the same pattern: "Oral Communication [تواصل شفهي]," "Text Study and Linguistic Knowledge [دراسة نص ومعارف لغوية]," "Written Expression [تعبير كتابي]." French-script disciplines were rendered in English with the French original in brackets on the parent subject only (FRENCH [FRANÇAIS]), since the sub-components inherit the track from the parent. Each row's coefficient and four grade columns were reproduced exactly, cell for cell.

Four smaller decisions supported the translation's defensibility. French grade-level designations (3ème B, 2nde B, and the 1re Bac Français track with the SES / HLP / LLCER specialties noted in the council's admission decision) were retained in their original form, because they are specific credentials of the French educational system; US substitutes would be guesses. European decimal notation in some of the cells (e.g., "11,8") was rendered with the US decimal point (11.8). The abbreviation "mc" in the column sub-headers (moyenne de la classe) was rendered as "ca" (class average). And the round stamp's Latin motto — "Initium Sapientiae Timor Domini" — was kept in Latin with the English meaning given once in parentheses, as is standard practice for institutional mottoes.

Expert Note

"Translator's Notes: (1) The original document is bilingual (French and Arabic); the substantive content is rendered once in English, with the original Arabic discipline names preserved in brackets after each Arabic-script subject for cross-reference. (2) Dates in DD-MM-YYYY format have been rendered as Month DD, YYYY; European-style decimal commas have been rendered with the US decimal point. (3) French grade-level designations and French Baccalaureate specialty abbreviations have been retained in their original form. (4) On the second page, the rightmost "Subject Average — ca" column is clipped at the right margin of the source scan; the visible digits are transcribed as shown."

Tariq Al-HassanMiddle Eastern Legal & Academic Translator

The Outcome

The certified translation was delivered to the client and forwarded to their credential evaluator. We routinely handle Lebanese francophone school documents — Collège de La Sagesse, Collège des Pères Antonins, Collège Notre-Dame de Jamhour, and comparable institutions — and the split-script discipline table is the norm for these schools, not the exception. The same approach (English translation with the original script preserved in brackets, coefficients reproduced cell for cell, French grade-level designations retained) has held up in every case.