New Students

General Information

When choosing your courses for the first semester, you will need information about the level at which you should enter a particular field of study. This process is known as "Placement." In areas where you are particularly well prepared, you may be placed into intermediate rather than beginning level courses. Where no placement exam is given, an interview with the department chair can determine your status.

Which placement exams should you take? When an exam is not required, the general rule of thumb is that if you have absolutely no prior experience with a subject, you do not need to take the placement exam. If you have any experience with a subject and are entertaining the possibility that you might take a course in that field at any point in your Haverford career, you should take the placement exam for that subject. You will have no other opportunity to do so. Some departments have specific guidelines that take precedence over this general rule of thumb.

Most placement exams and surveys will be available by June 12, with many available earlier in June, and must be completed by July 1, 2024. If you are not able to complete the online tests, please contact your Dean. You will receive your placement results, and your assigned writing seminar, by August 1st. If results are available earlier, they will be shared with students and their summer advisors.

Placement and credit are separate issues at the College. High scores on AP, IB or other types of exams can carry transferable credit, which can be used toward fulfilling credit requirements toward graduation. However, high scores on such exams will not automatically assure advanced placement in a particular subject at Haverford. Such placement depends upon judgments made by the appropriate departments based on your placement exams results or interviews with the chair. Advanced placement from Haverford placement exams administered online will not carry credit.

In order to accurately place you at the level which is best suited to your preparation and potential, you are expected to give your best effort while taking the exam under the principles of the Haverford Honor Code. If possible, we suggest completing the Academic Integrity Tutorial before taking your placement exams.

Placement exams are largely untimed. For exams with a time limit, extra time is built into the process. If you received an extra time accommodation on exams in high school due to a learning difference, and/or a medical, physical or psychological diagnosis you do not need to request this accommodation in advance of taking the placement exams. If you feel that timing was a factor in demonstrating your knowledge for a particular subject, please reach out to the faculty member listed as a contact.

Languages

Haverford College requires all of its students to complete two semesters of college-level study of a language other than English by the end of their junior year. This requirement may be satisfied in one of the following two ways:

1. One full year of language study in one language at the level in which the student is placed by the appropriate Haverford College language department; or
2. language study in a course conducted under Haverford College’s approved International Study Abroad Programs, and as certified in advance by the relevant language department chair at either Haverford or Bryn Mawr, or by the Existing Curriculum Committee when the language has no counter department at either Haverford or Bryn Mawr.

Language courses may be taken at Haverford, Bryn Mawr, Swarthmore, and with advisor and registrar permission, the University of Pennsylvania. The Haverford department, however, must determine placement. Courses taken to fulfill the language requirement do not meet divisional distribution requirements and may not be taken Pass/Fail at Haverford, CR/NCR at Bryn Mawr or Swarthmore, or P/F at the University of Pennsylvania.