You all may be wondering what is happening with my licensing stuff here in Ecuador. Well, yesterday (Tuesday) after getting my diplomas ‘officially’ translated into Spanish, getting things notarized etc…we (Olga and I) went back to the office thinking that things would probably go pretty smoothly since we did everything that was asked of us. That is not exactly what happened…
The person we saw was different this time. Because North Park University is not on the ‘list’ of schools that automatically are accepted here, we had to do a little more with this. The first thing she asked for was my actual diploma (which we were told I didn’t need, just a copy). Things pretty much stopped there because I didn’t have my actual diploma.
We then moved on to the Rush Diploma. I had my actual diploma and Rush IS approved here as a school they accept diplomas from. HOWEVER, they said it was not apostilled (internationally notarized) correctly. It is supposed to be on the actual diploma. We tried to explain that this is not typically done in the State because diplomas are official and I believe legal once they have the seal on them. I had the apostille, just not on the actual diploma. She then sent us to the notary to get some additional things done, but the notary wouldn’t notarize my diploma because it wasn’t apostilled the way I just explained. UGGGG!
We thought that we might be able to get this completed through the U.S. embassy here in Ecuador. I called them this morning and they told me that this official apostille has to be completed in the U.S. in the state here the diploma was obtained. UGGG again! SO, the process won’t be completed before we leave Ecuador. It’s not that it HAD to be done, we just wanted to get one thing off the list so it would be one less thing to do when we come back. God apparently has other plans…and that is OK! The good thing is, this special apostille they are talking all about is an agreement between Ecuador and the U.S. to make diplomas and titles official here or in the U.S. I think in the long run, this will be a good thing in regards to my practice here in Ecuador.
Thanks for your prayers! We appreciate them greatly!
The Santiago Partnership