I think Penn State said it’d be harder to go from Calc1 at a CC to Calc 2 at Penn State (since most CC classes are lighter than 4-year college classes, especially if compared to a flagship). So they could have recommended OP complete his basic sequence at his CC in order to avoid the weeder courses.
However, it’s my understanding that meteorology would ex^pect a much higher GPA than 2.88 and A’s to B+ in all your science courses.