Useful Information for Exchange Students in Mechanical Engineering

This document is maintained by your Academic Exchange Advisor, Prof. Giancarlo Ferrari Trecate

  • For inquiries about regulations and procedures (e.g., submission deadlines, language requirements, the possibility of taking master’s-level courses at the host university, the number of credits required to complete your Bachelor’s degree, where to find a module etc.)—in other words, questions unrelated to course contents:

    • The EPFL website usually addresses all these kinds of problems very well. Make sure you search within the EPFL website before proceeding with the next option. This presentation for outgoing students includes links to the relevant EPFL pages.
    • Otherwise, please do not ask me (I won’t be able to help you), but direct your questions to

  • Validation of the Learning Agreement (LA) – simplified procedure from 20/5/25

    • OUTGOING students
      • EPFL exchange application
        • Europe: before the application deadline, send me the PDF of the official EPFL LA form (composed of the list of university choices and the Learning Agreement with the list of courses for the university of your first choice) by email. Mention in your email that you are applying for an exchange for the first time. I will only sign the list of your university choices.
        • Outside of Europe: You must issue your LA after the selection. Please see paragraph “After the selection” below.
      • After the selection and before leaving for the exchange, send me the following documents:
        • The pdf of the official EPFL LA form for signature. This document will be signed only once before you leave. Should you make any changes afterwards, I will send you the confirmation by email but will not sign the LA again. 
        • The “correspondence table”, that is a table describing how the courses you have chosen map into the mandatory SGM courses (the list is here) and containing a brief description of each chosen course (copy and paste from the web or links to webpages). An example of the correspondence table associated with the first LA can be found here.
          Without both documents, your request won’t be processed. Do not send links to the documents, but attach the files to your email.
        • Most host universities accept EPFL’s Learning Agreement. However, should they insist on having their form signed, in case I have already signed your EPFL LA form, please contact [email protected] to obtain the signature.
      • During the exchange, you can modify their study plan as many times as you want. However, I have to approve every change. To this purpose, just send me the updated table of correspondences (not the LA form) with the changes highlighted –  here  is an example.
      • Once your study plan is finalized for the whole year please mention it in your email and send me the following documents:
        • The pdf of the official EPFL LA form with the final list of exams for signature. This document will be signed only once before you come back.
        • The final “correspondence table”.
          Without both documents, your request won’t be processed. Do not send links to the documents, but attach the files to your email.
    • INCOMING students. Send me the pdf of the LA (in the format of your home university). Please check that the LA does not contain courses restricted to EPFL students – the complete list is here.
      Most host universities accept EPFL’s Learning Agreement. However, should they insist on having their form signed, in case I have already signed your EPFL LA form, please contact [email protected] to obtain the signature.

  • Validation of the exchange year – OUTGOING  students only

    • Send me the complete transcript. To validate your Bachelor’s, you must obtain at least 180 ECTS after the exchange year. Otherwise:
      • If you score at least 170 ECTS, you can catch up with the missing credits during the first year of the master’s at EPFL
      • If you score less than 170 ECTS, you will have to repeat the third year at EPFL
      • In both cases, the study plan at EPFL must be approved by me before validating your exchange year
    • Once I receive the transcript, I validate the credits, and the SGM secretary submits the validation request to SAC. If you want to know the status of your Bachelor’s validation, please get in touch with SAC directly ([email protected]), not me. Due to the high volume of emails from exchange students, I regret that I’m unable to respond to this type of inquiry.