<p>ClassicRockerDad, how would you know your applicants started in community college? I have a young friend who is a junior at Brown this year, having started at community college. Her resume is going to say Brown '11, not community college '09.</p>
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<p>You can’t. You may think you are weeding out all that community college riff-raff, but I bet a lot are slipping through and doing just fine on the job.</p>
<p>Re post #18:</p>
<p>Wow, Mythmom, I’d like to come and take your classes. :)</p>
<p>Unfortunately, our local CC has NOTHING like that. Nothing at all. English and Philosophy classes are very basic.</p>
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<p>I think that they probably are good enough for MOST employers. Moreover, if the person started at a CC but graduated from a school of that caliber, that name on the resume is going to make a lot of difference.</p>
<p>When I was hiring technical writers I was looking for brainpower, plus certain other skills. I interviewed and hired people from unimpressive schools who had demonstrated their capabilities in some other way, but they were a rarity. Most of the people with the quick intelligence, intellectual curiosity, and great writing and communications skills that I was looking for were grads of top schools.</p>
<p>Terp, if you go to CC and then transfer up to a 4-year college like UCLA or UCB, you don’t list your 2-year in CC. It’s all about marketing. You list the institution that you receive your degree in.</p>
<p>When I first came to USA, almost everybody I knew when through the CC-route to learn some basic language classes before they transferred to a 4-year institution. However, lately my observation of D1’s friends who choose this route is that they are exposed to much older males then they are, some are taken advantage of their youth/naivety. While my daughter is still dealing with mostly students between 17-20 years of age during her first year of college.</p>
<p>*ClassicRockerDad, how would you know your applicants started in community college? I have a young friend who is a junior at Brown this year, having started at community college. Her resume is going to say Brown '11, not community college '09. *</p>
<p>The resume may say Brown '11, but the **application **will list all of the colleges the applicant attended and the years attended (if it’s filled out honestly). Your friend can’t say Brown '07-'11, because that wouldn’t be true.</p>
<p>On the job application a person must list ALL colleges attended and the years attended. You can’t leave off the CC.</p>
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<p>What type of schools do you think I can get a full tuition scholarship at?</p>
<p>There are many flagship and privates that give full tuition scholarships for an ACT 32 and a weighted GPA. I’ll come up with a list for you. You have missed some deadlines, but there are still some schools.</p>
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<p>I don’t think I’ve ever looked at an actual application. I generally have the resume in front of me when I do my screening and interview - a lot of times people don’t even fill out the app until the day they come in for an interview. After that, if I decide to hire them, the HR people generally just check the references, and that they got a degree from where they say they got one. I usually look the references over a little - but frankly, you’re usually not going to ask for a refernece from somebody who doesn’t like you. </p>
<p>I’d say this methodology has worked out pretty well for me in about 90% of cases. Once again, that’s just me.</p>
<p>^I agree. By the time, you get an application, you are nearly hired. It’s the resume that is more important. Hiring managers look at resume, not application.</p>
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<p>Maybe you are right and I just don’t know it. I can only go by my own personal experience as a hiring manager. I have never seen Brown or any other school of that caliber after a CC on a resume. I’m not a detective, I just get a pile of resumes and I “sort” them carefully but quickly. I’m sure I miss out on some great people.</p>
<p>Over 20% of the students at UC Berkeley are transfers, the very large majority of them from community college. Since most transfer students are juniors or seniors, that implies more than 20% of UCB graduates started in community college.</p>
<p>^They’re right.</p>
<p>We have had many transfers to Ivies from our local CC - let’s not even mention all of the transfers to “lesser” privates and perfectly fine publics, such as UMCP. But as they say, “the resume doesn’t list CC”. So if they did go to Harvard, it’s hardly ever even KNOWN to an employer (I was hired without even being asked for transcripts, much less a detailed list of every institution I was at…maybe it’s different for interns but I would say for many fields, they don’t even ask).</p>
<p>But it would be rare, anyway, even if you were aware of all the cases, for various reasons:</p>
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<li>It’s rare to get into an Ivy to begin with, transfer or not.</li>
<li>Many kids that end up going to CC are NOT smart enough (they had bad grades in HS, for example, and they’re going to get bad grades at CC)</li>
<li>The smart kids that did go there are a minority - there’s HUGE pressure amongst peers/parents for smart kids to avoid CC because it’s “13th year of HS”, it’s “not fun”, it’s “not living away from home”, it’s not “typical college experience,” it’s not “challenging” (debatable but true in many cases). But in certain instances where it’s a finance decision and the student is MATURE enough to accept the fact that life isn’t always perfect or the most fun, then they go the CC route.</li>
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<p>The only time I have heard of someone screening people because of the school they went to, rather than their accomplishments, was from a federal judge screening applicants for her clerk.</p>
<p>Although she herself attended a school less illustrious than those young adults who are applying to be an assistant, she has a very short list of schools that qualify- ( UChicago wouldn’t - she is * very* picky)</p>
<p>I attended a CC, one of the best educational experiences I ever had. I had unbelievably good literature course and composition courses. Worked for the first time in drama (not as an actor) which opened new doors of appreciation for the theater, had a fantastic evolutionary biology course and met a life-changing behavioral psychology professor. I eventually ended up with a graduate degree from a top research private in a program, at that time, ranked #1 in the country. My peers where primarily from elite universities and I discovered none were better educated or more well read than I. After many years and what some might call accomplishments, I proudly list my community college on my resume. I also never turn down a request to speak at a CC convocation. If the CC was not there, I would not be here.</p>
<p>But, my numbers coming out of HS were not nearly what the OP’s are. As has been said, there are many fine 4 year schools that would admit a student of this quality and likely provide a merit award. Doing well at a good 4 year LAC and transferring is a real option, just ask President Obama.</p>
<p>I tell kids all the time about the classmate who began at community college, transferred into an elite public university, then attended a top 20 law school and ultimately got a job offer from a ‘White Shoe’ law firm upon graduation.</p>
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<p>What’s curious is that he screens them for engineering, where the ‘Brown, or schools of that caliber’ are not even really renowned for engineering at all.</p>
<p>I’m a proponent fo Community College in many situations, but for the OP I still encourage you to apply to 4 yr schools now too.</p>
<p>My concern is the $ – there are too many schools that do not offer merit to transfer students. Given the late date, are there still 4 yr that the merit deadline has not passed?</p>
<p>^^^</p>
<p>Yes, there are some… I’ll come up with a list and post. :)</p>
<p>ClassicRockerDad: You do yourself an injustice. It sounds like you are rejecting those candidates who completed their education at an institution whose PROGRAM you don’t respect. Sounds perfectly legitimate, especially for engineering.</p>
<p>It doesn’t sound as if you would discriminate against a candidate who began at community college and went on to “cut the mustard” at a program you did respect.</p>
<p>Sounds perfectly legitimate to me.</p>
<p>Sounds like your beef is actually with inadequate four year degrees.</p>
<p>@Consolation: Our community college has been called “The Harvard of Community Colleges”, which I think sounds elitist and ridiculous.</p>
<p>But it is a fabulous place. </p>
<p>We have 22,000 students. My department, the English department, has 100 full-time profs; all new-hires (past 20 years I’d say) have PhD’s.</p>
<p>We petitioned to become a four year school (frankly needed with such a large student population) but we were rejected. Too bad.</p>
<p>We have also been developing a certification in Holocaust studies that I help pilot for high school history teachers.</p>
<p>It’s a happening place.</p>
<p>It’s probably a happy spot for me because I can actually teach outside of my discipline and interdepartmental courses that I doubt I could teach at a more elite school.</p>
<p>So I teach Shakespeare right alongside post-modernism.</p>
<p>And since I’m omnivorous when it comes to knowledge, this suits me. I love keeping my toes in science.</p>
<p>I must say, that my resume would not reflect my abilities because I have lackluster degrees. I was too hippie to let my parents pay for college so I graduated a year early and put myself through school. Allowed me to avoid control issues.</p>
<p>Then my H did not support the loans and relocation it would have involved to use my Ivy acceptance to grad school, so another lackluster degree.</p>
<p>Still, I do understand ClassicRockerDad that in a field a precise as engineering he wants to ensure that his employees have been properly trained.</p>
<p>I came into college with the same level of insight I left grad school with. Don’t think teachers taught me much, but I did have the structure in which to teach myself.</p>
<p>As of the OP: With the resume you present, I don’t think Chicago was a good place to start. If you want an affordable four-year institution I suggest one of the SUNY campuses; they offer very good value for OOS students, and there are so many of them I suspect you would be accepted at a few. I don’t think you’re very competitive for merit money with the grades you have presented unless your test scores are through the roof.</p>
<p>Those of you who have read my previous posts on the topic of cc’s know that my 3 siblings and I all started at cc, finished our degrees and (except for me, and I’m a CPA) received advanced degrees. I also know MANY other professionals who started at cc. Many finished degrees at prestigious schools.</p>
<p>Thankfully my siblings and I have never been discriminated in hiring because of this. One of my siblings started in a staff position at a company and eventually worked his way up to become President of that company. I think someone is probably glad that they did not refuse to hire him because he started at cc. </p>
<p>For those who feel that you “don’t get the college experience” if you start at cc, remember that cc is NOT the same experience as high school. I found it to be a great transition ( I was only 17 when I started) and by the time I transferred I was more mature and ready to live on my own. After I transferred I became very active in my new college’s campus life, joined a sorority,etc. I didn’t miss a thing.</p>
<p>To the OP: by all means consider cc especially if the one in your area is a good one. Talk to the guidance counselors there about transfer requirements as well as scholarships for cc transfers.</p>
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<p>This is exactly the process at my company. The hiring manager would pretty much never know about some school that is not listed on the resume. The application is an almost after-the-fact pro forma for the HR files.</p>
<p>I think the OP would be better off applying to some more 4-yr schools, especially those with good financial aid, and then looking to transfer. </p>
<p>I’m an engineering manager, and I have to somewhat agree with ClassicRockerDad that if I noticed that a job applicant had CC on his/her resume (for 2 yrs, not for say a summer class), it would have a negative impact on me. I’m not saying that it would be enough for me to rule out the candidate completely, but it would make me scrutinize the qualifications more carefully.</p>