<p>I see lots of action plans involving attending community college with plans to transfer to UCLA or Berkeley, but what about attending a high quality private LAC for two years? It would seem to provide the best of both educational opportunities. Small focussed classes for the general education requirements the first two years followed by last two years with top professors in a specific major. Also, total cost of attendance would be at least a third less than 4 years at the small private.</p>
<p>Given their reinvigorated "holistic" approach to admissions, the drop out rate for Freshmen and Sophomores is bound to continue increasing at UC, so it would seem more spots should be opening up for Juniors & Seniors. </p>
<p>Or do kids so love their LAC that they are unlikely to want to transfer after 2 years?</p>
<p>momsquad- I think many start off at the community college in order to save money. Two years at a small liberal arts college does not achieve that goal.
Also the UC’s are geared to take transfers from California community colleges. Most community colleges in Ca have guaranteed transfer programs with specific UC’s. Also they have the IGETC program that CC students can follow in order to get their general education requirements done at the CC.</p>
<p>The principal reason for two years at a CC followed by two at a state university is to save money, not to enhance educational opportunities.</p>
<p>For the research-oriented student whose family can afford it, I think 4 years at the same school – one where research opportunities are available – is the best choice. Students who become involved in research often get to know about the research programs in their major department and become acquainted with specific professors well before junior year. Transfer students may be at a disadvantage in this regard. </p>
<p>On the other hand, if the goal is access to advanced (including graduate) courses rather than research opportunities, transfer to a major university after two years at an LAC might be a good idea. The LAC is likely to have enough courses in the student’s major to meet even a very advanced student’s needs during the first two years, but the university will offer more for the final two years.</p>
<p>We have seen a fair amount of this during the recession: kids get into “dream schools,” but they have to take out student loans. By the end of sophomore year, the debt is too much to continue and there is a transfer to state flagship.</p>
<p>I’ve read of students making a LAC-to-UC junior transfer, but it’s caused by money issues. I can’t remember any case of a student wanting greater research opportunities at a UC. </p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Maybe, maybe not. Classes might not transfer over. There might be additional graduation requirements. Grades might be too low for a transfer, transfer requirements and capacity could tighten. UC tuition could go up more than expected.</p>
<p>One more issue to consider: Students who spend two years at a CC and then transfer don’t have the option of staying on a campus where they have made good friends. They have to leave, and all the other students in their position are also leaving (some, probably, to attend the same state university).</p>
<p>But a student at an LAC who leaves after two years is leaving friends that he could have stayed with for two more years. This could be a brutally painful experience, especially if he has made good friends and likes the school.</p>
<p>Yes, I realize that many times the transfer decisions are based on financial constraints. However I am wondering whether anyone has taken this route as a specific educational strategy. The Freshman/Sophomore undergraduate experience at UC is, in many cases, a zoo of huge classes and disillusioned classmates struggling to survive.</p>
<p>With regard to the social aspects, CA N and S has an abundant selection of high quality LAC’s. Kids could easily meet up on weekends for socializing.</p>
<p>The way the it works in california is that californian cc kids get first chance for transferring in to ucs, then students from the state schools, then everyone else, so someone trying to transfer in the state uc system from is e bottom of the pile…that is how they encourage kids to go to cc, they get first dibs on the ucs…</p>
<p>momsquad, from what I know of UCLA and Cal, I just don’t see it being “easy” to meet up with friends from other schools on weekends. It’s not impossible, but the environment in Berkeley/San Francisco/Westwood/Santa Monica isn’t like what you’d find in, say, Boston. </p>
<p>It’s possible that a student may start off at a LAC and decide later that they want to transfer to a big research U for more research opportunities, but it’s not something that can be predicted or planned for. </p>
<p>Junior year transfer also generally rules out study abroad.</p>
<p>Someone looking at this type of thing might want to consider the following:</p>
<ol>
<li><p>If the student is advanced enough that s/he will be taking upper division courses in his/her first two years, then s/he is likely to benefit from attending UC starting as a freshman, where s/he will have fewer than typical large freshman courses while getting to smaller upper division courses soon.</p></li>
<li><p>If the student is not advanced, then s/he may find the smaller classes at the community colleges to be an inexpensive way to start out and prepare for transfer to UC as a junior.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>Not sure how well doing the first two years at a LAC works. In the first case, the upper division courses at the LAC may be harder to match up with the UC being transferred to than the more standardized lower division courses; in the second case, the LAC would just be more expensive than the community college. Plus, UCs favor transfers from community colleges and provide pre-arranged course articulation, transfer acceptance guarantees in some cases, and other information for community college students (see [Welcome</a> to ASSIST](<a href=“http://www.assist.org%5DWelcome”>http://www.assist.org) ).</p>
<p>Only kids I knew who pursued this route from my private LAC were those who had to leave for financial reasons. Keep in mind this was in the mid-late 1990’s. </p>
<p>It was also perceived as a serious academic stepdown depending on major with the exception of Berkeley. </p>
<p>As for lower division LAC courses not being good matches for the UC/public flagship upper-division courses, that cannot be further from the truth. Nearly everyone I knew who transferred to a UC or a flagship like UT-Austin found their GPAs skyrocketed while simultaneously finding themselves with much more free time despite taking upper-division courses and greater courseloads.</p>
<p>I know some LACs have special programs (esp for engineering or some science disciplines) where you do 2 or 3 years at the LAC, then take specialized classes at a research university. In the NW, Lewis&CLark and Whitman come to mind; don’t recall if I saw any in CA that did. I don’t think you save any money by doing this; most of the affiliated unis are private (on the order of USC, Columbia).</p>
<p>I went to a LAC and knew several people who transferred to UCs and four-year privates after two years. This works well for some people. LACs offer many advantages, but they can also start to seem a little small after 2-3 years. One of my friends who was a budding playwright had a couple of his plays produced and did really well but then wanted a bigger challenge and went to a private u in a big city with a lot of theater. Another friend wanted a more bustling campus and went to Berkeley. And let’s not forget that Obama pursued this route, transferring from Occidental to Columbia.</p>
<p>The question that I would have today is how difficult it is to transfer to a UC from a LAC? UC admissions can be mysterious, so you might want to look into whether students these days are getting into UCs (and which ones) as transfers from LACs.</p>
<p>Thank you Copterguy! You’ve described exactly the scenarios I envisioned. I hadn’t even thought about the Obama transfer, another good example. Yes, a school with fewer than 2000 students can become very small, especially after sophomore year when you are older than 50% of the students (assuming no grad school at the LAC).</p>
<p>Neighbor’s kid went to a highly ranked LAC as a math major and felt pretty constrained on the math front. (He’d gone having already completed multivariate calculus at our local flagship, as I recall.) Transferred to the flagship and was happy as a clam because there were so many more classes and professors to pick from and they welcomed his enrollment in a number of graduate classes that were in areas of math that matched his interests. He did the Budapest semester in math (which is a pretty famous program, I gather) and worked with several of the professors on research projects. </p>
<p>I know more who’ve transferred for financial reasons, or homesickness, but he’s the one I know who simply decided that he wanted a bigger pond academically. </p>
<p>(I think this might have been very different had his interests been something more in the humanities.)</p>
<p>A student who is very advanced in math and intending to be a math major is a typical example of a poor fit for an undergraduate-only LAC, since such a student would likely exhaust the undergraduate math offerings and want to take graduate level math courses. Such a student would also be a poor fit for starting at a community college, since s/he would have no opportunity to take junior and senior level math courses as a freshman or sophomore.</p>
<p>That’s not what I heard from several high school alums who were math majors with advanced standing at many well-respected LACs…including my own. So long as they chose an LAC with strong Profs in their areas of interest, they’ve managed to bypass this issue by taking private readings and/or doing special research projects with their Profs. Some of the latter could be combined with collaborations with other math departments or research institutes. It is also a good preparation for expectations of grad school as if students are already at a level ready to take actual grad courses* by junior year…they’re also expected to take much more initiative and independent role in their own education process than your average undergrad. </p>
<p>And I am coming at this from the perspective that an average undergrad should already be responsible for around 90%+ of his/her education/learning process as he/she is no longer in high school where teachers, counselors, and parents are still keeping daily tabs and reminders to ensure the students are staying on top of their academics and ECs. </p>
<p>I’d see the purported “LAC constraint” more of an issue if we’re talking technical or natural sciences due to access to expensive cutting-edge laboratories. However, the negative impact of this issue varies by specific LAC* as my undergrad college has been known for its STEM departments…especially neuroscience, bio, and chem. </p>
<p>Several classmates who majored in those fields and math have gone on to do grad-level work at various topflight STEM PhD programs including Harvard and MIT. </p>
<ul>
<li>Just because a particular university has labeled a course as a “grad course” does not necessarily mean it is taught at a higher level than an equivalent undergrad course at a respectable LAC. From my own experience and those of various classmates at various elite unis…including some Ivies…the level is often no different and sometimes, even lower than what we experienced in our LAC’s intermediate-upper division courses. I heard this is even more true if we’re talking about lower-tiered universities or grad fields such as education.</li>
</ul>