3.8 GPA English Major-Transfer Recommendations?

Hi all! I’m currently a sophomore English Literature major who dislikes my school greatly. I’m looking into transferring–but could really use some suggestions on schools that would be a good fit. I had a 3.2 in high school and have now grinded to get a 3.8 in college. Therefore, I’m not sure what schools are comfortable for my GPA range now that it’s improved so greatly. I currently attend a small liberal arts school and I’m looking for something bigger(maybe more medium-sized–not ginormous). On-campus, I’m the Student Body Treasurer, RA, and a Sorority Sister. I am open to anywhere across the U.S. I want a school that will challenge me more, yet will be affordable enough for my family. Props if it has a good English program! Help me out! <3 Happy New Year!

With respect to your interest in English literature, the descriptions in these articles (although ostensibly oriented toward creative writing programs) may offer you a few ideas for colleges to research further:

What does “affordable” mean to you?

What is your state of residency?

I’m in NH–highest in-state tuition in the country. Price wise, 20,000 or less is what’s going to work best. I’m currently at 50,000 dollars in scholarships from my small liberal arts school in PA and paying about 17,000 out of pocket. There should be colleges out there that I can finagle the same amount of out.

The hard part is that the best need-based financial aid usually comes from the most selective colleges, some of which admit few transfer students. Merit scholarships tend to be less common for transfer students.

I take it UNH is not affordable? List price is about $31k if you live on campus, of which about $18k is in-state tuition and books. If you can commute there while living with parents, it may be barely affordable at list price after adding in live-at-home and commuting costs to the $18k of tuition and books costs if you would not get any financial aid there. But if you are not in commuting range and would not get any financial aid there, it is significantly over your $20k limit.

Others may be able to help you better if you mention what you dislike about your current college, so that they do not name colleges that share the characteristics that you dislike.

I know your in-state COA baseline isn’t great, but it may still be worth looking at programs that qualify for NEBHE reciprocity, and see if there are desirable programs where you might also get some merit. https://www.nebhe.org/info/pdf/tuitionbreak/2021-22/BACHELOR’s_Programs-NH_Residents.pdf The Comparative Literature major at UMass Amherst is on this list, which sounds possibly promising in terms of what you’re looking for college-wise and program-wise, but I’m not familiar with whether there’s merit available for transfers.

In general, it’s much tougher to get merit as a transfer than as a first-year applicant. Your current under-20K out-of-pocket may be tough to match without dropping way down in competitiveness.

You could consider SIUC, which allows all students to pay in-state rates and has some merit $ for transfers as well. They have a strong English department with a creative writing MFA program. But even with the max merit and the in-state tuition, you’d be looking at around 27K/year out of pocket.