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I am an EU citizen who has completed a Master's degree in a Belgian university. I have applied to some PhD programmes in Germany which require that foreign degree holders provide proof of comparability.

The issue is that my specific degree is not in the anabin database, and so I've started the process of obtaining a statement of comparability, which however could last up to 3 months. In the meantime I've heard no response from the programmes I've applied to. Could it be that they rejected my application because I haven't supplied the statement of comparability yet or are they supposed to give me time to bring them the statement after the fact?

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    For EU degrees you do not need a statement of comparability, and PhD applications do not depend on this either, Universities do their own evaluation of academic degrees, the ZAB stuff is mostly for migration (which you do not need).
    – Dr. Snoopy
    Commented Oct 12, 2023 at 19:44
  • @Dr.Snoopy That's not entirely true. I've had such an evaluation used to determine my salary scale working for the German government.
    – gerrit
    Commented Oct 13, 2023 at 7:03
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    @gerrit People can ask for things that are not really needed, you are probably aware how much variance there is in the process of determining German payment scale levels. I believe it is very unlikely to be rejected from a PhD program because of this, there are much more strong alternatives than silly bureaucracy.
    – Dr. Snoopy
    Commented Oct 13, 2023 at 7:14
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    @gerrit Importantly what I said is that Universities, for academic purposes (not employment) do their own evaluation of degrees, for admission to an academic program they do not rely on ZAV (which is part of employment agencies), as I said, they do their own evaluation of degrees.
    – Dr. Snoopy
    Commented Oct 13, 2023 at 7:17
  • @Dr.Snoopy OK, but typically in Germany, PhD students are also employees of the university. OP should ask the university in any case.
    – gerrit
    Commented Oct 13, 2023 at 8:47

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Could it be that they rejected my application because I haven't supplied the statement of comparability yet or are they supposed to give me time to bring them the statement after the fact?

Probably the latter, but ask the university to be sure.

When I applied to work for the German federal government, they checked on my Dutch Master and Swedish PhD degrees. Those checks take time and did not arrive in time for the start of my contract, although they did arrive within the probation period. What happened in the end is that they initially hired me in a lower-ranked position, then retroactively upgraded me once the approval was in.

It might be different for you. Ask the universities you have applied to to confirm.

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