<p>The CSUs that <em>might</em> have empty spaces on campus are probably the unpopular ones - like Monterey or Stanislaw, etc - and probably don’t have well developed engineering courses.</p>
<p>Does SLO have an Open U option? (For example, at SJSU, a student can take Open U classes, up to 24 credits, that MAY transfer to SJSU if they get accepted at a later point, but no guarantees.)</p>
<p>If, however, it is truly “plan B” – he might want to take another year at CC and take some challenging courses to just round out his education (when else will he have a freebie year to do that?) – or take a year off and earn money – or try to find an internship or go abroad for awhile. </p>
<p>He needs to look at this like a “gap year” and make it MEAN something to <em>him</em>. Really – when he’s 60 years old, he won’t care if he got his BS degree when he was 22, 24 or 26. Really. Whatever ship he wants to sail on will swing around into the bay again every single year for the rest of his life – and he’s not the only one who lost his boarding pass this year. The only thing he can do, assuming other options are closed, is to do something COOL this year that has him experience life, work, education in a different way. Tell him to get really depressed and sad for about a week - and then to go do something vibrant and interesting with his gap year.</p>
<p>Best of luck.</p>