Apostille of the Hague

To begin the process for an Apostille of the Hague for a diploma or transcript, the Registrar's Office needs the following:

1) A letter from the student, signed and dated, requesting a duplicate copy of her/his diploma or an official copy of their transcript, and requesting that it be notarized, certified by the County Clerk, and sent to the New York State Department of State for an Apostille of the Hague for the country in which it will be used.  The student also needs to include the address where the Apostille document is to be sent.   It is helpful if the student includes a letter to be sent to the New York State Department of State requesting the Apostille and specifying the country it is for and the address to which it is to be sent—this will save some time as the Registrar's Office won't have to write that letter.

2) For a duplicate copy of the diploma the student needs to send us a check made out to SUNY Potsdam for $10.00—alternatively, the student can send us a clear Xerox copy of their diploma which we can verify.  There is no charge for an official transcript.  For the certification by the County Clerk, the student needs to send us a check for $3.00 made out to the St. Lawrence County Clerk, and for the Apostille, she/he needs to include a check for $10.00 made out to the New York State Department of State.  If the student needs Apostilles for both the transcript and the diploma, then fees need to be included for each document, or $6.00 for the County Clerk and $20.00 for the Department of State.

3) This process takes a considerable amount of time, especially if the Apostille is being mailed to a foreign country, sometimes as much as a month.  First there is the time involved to have a duplicate diploma or transcript printed, then to write a letter verifying that the signatures on the document are "true and correct", then to have it notarized on campus, then to send it to the County Clerk's office for certification, then for it to be mailed it to Albany, and then for the State Department to process it and send it to its final destination.  The amount of time can be reduced if the student is able to pick up the certified document and take it to the Department of State Office in Albany and then carry or express mail it to its destination, or if she/he includes prepaid express mailing envelopes to send the document to Albany and then for the Department of State to send the document to its destination.  Note: the Registrar's Office does not offer express mailing services.

4) Please contact the Registrar, Ramona Ralston, at ralstorm@potsdam.edu or (315) 267-3090 if you have specific Apostille questions.