Hello everyone,
I’m currently at a CC and would be transferring as a junior in fall 2020. I’m looking to transfer to schools such as Georgia Tech, Vanderbilt, UoWashington, UT-Austin, USC, UMD college park, Rutgers(all out of state)… I’m a CS major and I think I may be reaching too high even if I achieve the stats below, so please let me know if you guys think I would have any chances.
Also, if you have any suggestions of schools let me know.
Info about me:
Highschool:
2 Gap years after highschool (Parent issues, worked during these years)
HS GPA: 2.96 (yikes)
SAT: 1380/2400 (yikes)
no ACT, APs, anything else
Community College:
over 60 Credits completed (up to calc 3, lin alg, discrete, calc-based physics, higher level cs courses…)
GPA: 4.0/4.0
White male, first gen college student, lower middle class
ECs: Phi Theta Kappa active member, an academic paper published to school journal, charity involvement, possibly a summer of research under a professor or internship.
A few small personal CS projects.
Can get LoR, can write solid essay.
I’m finishing up my freshman year now and in good standing. I’m just wondering if I’m being unrealistic and getting my hopes up of the possibility of transferring to any of the above schools, even if I maintain these stats next year…
Thanks a lot!
Two issues for “realistic” –
- how will you pay for these schools? Most of them are public OOS – very high tuition.
- while your GPA is great at CC and in tough classes, your admissin may be limited by your SAT scores. Can you retake them? If you can do Calc III, you should be able to do better on your SATs. Some schools do require SAT scores from transfer students.
I would look at private schools, such as U of Rochester, Northeastern, Santa Clara, Lehigh, LaFayette, Union in NY state, RPI, RIT, WPI (but this one is pricy) and even NYU, Boston U, Vanderbilt is on your list, SMU, Stevens insitute of technology, University of the Pacific, USC is also on your list.
What is your home state?
It is good that you will have two strong years at community college, because that will go a very long way to make up for your high school GPA. Universities know that some teenagers are lacking in focus, and that many of us get it together as we get older and more mature.
U.Mass Amherst might be marginally safer than most of the schools on your list, and has a very strong CS program with many high tech jobs nearby. U.Mass Lowell would be safer, although I would go to U.Mass Amherst over Lowell if you can get accepted.
Are you okay with being full pay at any of the schools on your list?
The cost of out of state public schools is likely to be high, since public schools typically do not give financial aid to out of state students.
Consider your in state public schools and good financial aid private schools.
Do the parent issues you mention involve divorce? If so, many of the good financial aid private schools want both parents’ finances.
@Dustyfeathers
I am confused as to why WPI was “pricey.” The following costs data sets were taken directly from respective university websites:
RPI $71,998 for 2018-2019 school year;
WPI $69,812 for 2019-20 school year (i.e., next year);
BU lists total estimated expenses as $69,668.
The WPI price actually includes a $5,000 automatic credit toward the cost of any seven week off campus research project at over 50 centers around the world.
Most students do not pay these list prices at any of these universities. You will do better to look for the best programs that match your requirements and at least run the Net Price Calculator (NPC) for those selected Universities. Costs are not irrelevant, but blanket statements may not reflect actual GROUP data.
Thanks everyone for the replies. I tried to comment before but it seems like they are not posting. @Dustyfeathers, I will definitely retake the SAT now and also take a look at NYU and Boston U as being near a city is important to me. @DadTwoGirls My home state is Pennsylvania and I will need to take out loans for most of the costs of college. @ucbalumnus My parent issue was my father passing away.
!
My home state is Pennsylvania. I would be using pretty much all loans to pay for school, so I guess paying full tuition for 2 years plus room and board may be a little unnerving.
Thanks a lot, @Dustyfeathers for the information/reply. Retaking the SAT was something I considered, I just was not sure how retaking it as a college student would come across to prospective colleges. It is definitely something I will do.
Will also for sure look into/research NYU and Boston U as being in a university near a city is important to me. I’ve read that Vanderbilt can be very generous with aid packages to transfer students, which is why it was close to the top of my list.
I hope you understand that both NYU and BU cost over $70,000 a year. Where will those loans come from??
If you are a PA resident…apply to Pitt…at least you will have instate tuition status…and Pittsburgh is a city.
If you are attending a PA community college, you want to talk to the transfer advisor ASAP about schools with articulation agreements with your CC. That advisor might also know about financial aid opportunities for CC transfers.
You might consider (use net price calculators):
Carnegie Mellon
https://admission.enrollment.cmu.edu/pages/transfer-admission
University of Michigan (actually provides need based aid to some oos)
https://finaid.umich.edu/wp-content/uploads/transferbrochure-2018_non-res.pdf
Case Western Reserve University
https://case.edu/financialaid/for-undergraduates/applying-for-undergraduate-aid/transfer-students
Usually student borrowing is limited to the federal loan $7500/yr (juniors/seniors) and whatever your parent is willing to borrow for you.
@BuckeyeMWDSG
The net price calculators won’t be accurate UNLESS they specifically ask if the student is a transfer student.
Most NPCs are set up for entering freshmen.
Great point - most schools do not provide similar need based aid to transfer students. A few do. Case, Cornell and Umich seem to provide some need based aid to transfer students and provide instructions to transfer students on how to run their net price calculators.
It really is a waste to apply to schools that do not provide aid to transfer students, unless that student is able to pay full sticker.
And: FA policies change yearly. So student needs to double check aid policies/calculators again before applying. But even if the best aid packages go to freshman - at least that lets the applicant know if something will be out of range financially and can move on.
Frankly, I would take NYU and BU right off the list. They are very costly schools that don’t give terrific need based aid and absolutely do not meet full need for all accepted students.
Loans more than $7,500 per year (for juniors and seniors) require a cosigner.
If you are not borrowing the federal direct loans now, you may want to do so and save them to help pay for the more expensive junior and senior years.
Unfortunately, Pennsylvania in-state financial aid is poor.
USC (Southern California) may be your best shot out of your list, since it is most likely to be affordable, and it takes a relatively large number of transfers (1,448 matriculants out of 2,338 admits out of 9,673 applicants in a recent year), many from community colleges (49% from community colleges in California). But it is still highly selective (and 30% of transfers are scions/legacies), so admission is far from guaranteed.
https://admission.usc.edu/wp-content/uploads/Transfer-Profile-18_19.pdf
Thanks for the suggestions. Carnegie would be nice, but based on what I’ve heard it is very unlikely that I would get in.
Also for the tuition, if net price calculators are at all accurate, then it doesn’t seem like the loans I would need to take out would be too ridiculous, I do take the figures they give with a grain of salt though… Pitt will be considered as well.
Look for some of the AITU universities that offer transfer scholarships. These might be a better choice than an out of state public university. The best would be an in state public.
Unfortunately, the OP is in Pennsylvania, where in state public schools have notoriously bad financial aid (Pitt and PSU NPCs show net prices of over $20k for the very lowest income scenario for a Pennsylvania resident).
@retiredfarmer – I was basing my prices on those estimated through the website College Navigator. I was assuming that this person wasn’t making that much money as OP is young and starting out. That puts this person in the lower rungs of income.
It’s a valid point that a school gives funding for a research project. While $5K is larger than most, it’s not unique. And I’m not sure that it counters the higher average net price after FA.
you should be good for like GT and Austin, USC and UMD