When a German Overall Grade Doesn't Match the Module Grades

A German Bachelor's Certificate in Two Versions

A client sent us a German Bachelor of Arts certificate in two versions, plus the module grade list that goes with it. The overall grade on these records doesn’t match the module grades, and one module grade sits outside the German scale. The client needed a German degree certificate translation for a credential evaluation by World Education Services (WES).

The issuer is a private German Hochschule, a higher-education institution whose letterhead carries the English line “University of Applied Sciences” under its German name. The HRK, the German Rectors’ Conference, describes these universities as application-oriented and focused on professional study. The degree title, Bachelor of Arts (B.A.), is printed in English on the German page, so it carries over unchanged.

Both certificate versions share their wording, signatories and date, except for one clause. The first states the overall grade, the Gesamtnote; the second ends at “bestanden” (passed) and leaves the grade out. Many German universities split this paperwork differently, into an Urkunde that confers the degree and a Zeugnis that carries the grades.

The other document is the Abschlussdokumentation (graduation documentation), a module-by-module grade list. Each Modul (module) gets a grade or a pass mark, such as Erfüllt (fulfilled) or Bestanden (passed), and its Leistungspunkte, the ECTS credit points. The list closes with the thesis and the overall grade.

The redacted image below shows the two certificate versions side by side.

How We Kept the Gesamtnote and Every Module Grade as Printed

We translated all four pages in full: both certificate versions and the two-page grade list. The grade list got the same treatment as a German transcript translation: every row, column and footnote. German decimal commas became decimal points, so an illustrative 1,7 reads 1.7.

Every module grade, credit value and overall grade appears exactly as printed, on both documents that state it. Before delivery we re-checked the arithmetic and confirmed each value against the source at high magnification. The credit points reconciled; the credit-weighted mean did not reproduce the overall grade, with or without the out-of-scale module.

We changed nothing, because the certificate prints no formula and any adjustment would put our guess in place of the university’s figure. The mismatch itself got no note either: that would be our arithmetic, not the document’s content. Among the grades, only the out-of-scale value got a Translator’s Note, so no reader mistakes it for our typing error.

Expert Note

"In the module list on the second page, the grade for the module “[module name]” is printed as “[value]” in the original. German grades run from 1.0 (best) to 5.0 (fail), so this value falls outside that scale; it has been reproduced exactly as printed and not corrected."

Klaus WeberEuropean Medical & Scientific Translator

The certificate packet has notes of its own. One records that its two pages match in every field except the overall grade, and that both are translated in full. Another explains German word order: the closing verb, erhalten (received), moves forward in English, so that sentence ends one line higher than in the original.

One more detail stayed as printed. The head of the examinations office signs with a shorter title on the certificate than on the grade list. We rendered each title as it appears rather than harmonizing them.

The Outcome

CertTranslate delivered two certified packets in August 2026 for the client’s WES credential evaluation: one for the grade list, one for both certificate versions. Each follows our translation for credential evaluation format: a complete English translation, a signed Certification of Translation Accuracy, and a copy of the German original.

The client’s order had asked whether a standard certified translation meets WES requirements. WES asks for exact, word-for-word, complete translations, and that is what each packet contains.