Hi, I’m planning on going to a California community college in hopes of transferring to a UC for computer science. I have a horrible high school GPA (received D’s and F’s/ retook multiple classes my freshman-junior year). Despite this I still tried my best to apply to multiple colleges as less competitive majors (which hurt my soul because I’m really interested in comp. sci. but I knew it would be way too competitive with my grades). Anyway I did not get into any of the schools I applied to and now I’m planning on going to community college.
This past year (my senior year) I have put a lot more effort into school than I ever have and so far I have gotten all A’s (even with 8 hard classes). With my performance over the past year I’ve become confident that I could get all A’s (or at least high grades) at community college if I continue to try as hard as I’ve been for the past year. I was really excited to go to community college since it would be like a second chance, but then I found out dual enrollment from high school is included on your community college transcript.
My high school offered some classes which counted for dual enrollment credit at Compton College, I happened to take 2 my freshman year and 1 my sophomore year. I don’t even know how many college credits those classes counted for but in the freshman classes I took I received a B in semester 1, and an A in semester 2, then in the other class a C in semester 1 and an A in semester 2. My sophomore year I got a B in semester 1 and an A in semester 2. In addition, I took 2 dual enrollment classes the summer before my sophomore year at LBCC. Each class was 5 credits, I took Algebra 2 which I got a B in and Elementary Japanese 1 which I received a C in.
I plan on going to Orange Coast College in the fall. The previous dual enrollment grades I got will significantly lower my GPA, I checked and it seems like most UCs accept people with at the lowest a 3.8 GPA for computer science. I don’t know if I’ll be able to get that, even if I do I’ll still have a lower chance for getting in to those schools for computer science.
I’m just wondering if there is anyway to remove these grades so I can start fresh at community college, or if there’s some way they won’t be factored in to my transfer GPA since I’m going to be transferring from a different community college than where I got those grades. If I receive all A’s over the next 2 years will I still have less of a chance than other cc transfers to get into a UC for comp. sci.? Does anyone have any advice for me to be a competitive comp. sci. transfer despite the bad dual enrollment grades?
(I know grades aren’t the only thing involved in admissions, but I also know that they’re a major deciding factor for acceptance/ rejection which is why I’m worried)
Thank you for reading I know this was long :DD
Were all of those college courses you took in high school transferable? Transfer GPA | UC Admissions indicates that GPA for transfer applicants is calculated on transferable courses.
Thank you so much I didn’t know about this, I just checked and only one of the courses I took seem to be transferable, Algebra 2 at LBCC, which I got a B in. Do you have any ideas for how I could retake the class to possibly get an A or do you think it wouldn’t hurt my chances if I just kept it and did better going forward?
I just realized I checked it wrong, it seems like all of the courses I took are transferable, but only Algebra counts for one of the five areas of the seven-course requirements. Same question, is there a way I could possibly bring these grades up or remove them, or would it not hurt if I just kept them?
Not sure this will work. You can take more than the required credits to transfer and try to water down the effect of these B 's and C’s.
Not sure the 3.8 you mention is the GPA of all the courses or a specific set of courses needed to transfer. @GumbyMom can clarify.
You can check with the college where you took the DE classes and see if repeating the classes is an option. For the UC application, you will be required to report both the original grade and the repeat grade but the repeat grades will be used in the GPA calculation for transfer.
If repeating is not an option, then as suggested by @sfogooner you would need to take more units to help dilute the bad grades. The UC’s will put mire emphasis on your more recent grades but they will remain on your permanent college record.
The CC academic advisor could help you formulate a plan to reach your goal.
Best of luck.
Thank you so much for the information :DD I just checked and I can repeat the courses once 36 months has passed (which should be this September) but their policy says both the repeated class and the original class grade will be calculated into GPA. Does this mean for my UC application they will also take the average of both in my GPA or will they still do what you said which is only use the repeat grades for GPA transfer calculation?
Here is the UC policy on repeat courses/grades.
Repeated courses
A student is allowed to repeat each course in which a C-, D+, D, F or NP grade was originally earned, as many times as necessary, until the first time he or she earns a letter grade of C or better. The following rules apply:
- The replacement (repeat) course must have curriculum similar to the original course (the same content but not necessarily the same title).
- The new grade earned will replace the deficient grade in the GPA calculation. UC does not average the grades.
- All coursework (original and repeats) must be reported on the admission application.
- A non-honors course can be used as a repeat of an honors-level course.
- An honors-level course may be used as a repeat of a non-honors course.
- Repeat of C (2.0) grades is not allowed.
- Repeat of courses out of sequence is not allowed.
- Students may not repeat a lower-level course if a grade of D- or higher has already been earned in a higher-level course.
- UC courses must be repeated at UC, but not necessarily at the original campus.
Does this apply to classes taken at community college too? Because if this does I would not be able to retake any of the courses even though the cc I took them at originally has a different retake policy. So if I can’t retake the courses do you have any other idea for how I could somehow start fresh or do something about the bad grades?
Yes, the information applies to CC’s however each CC can set their own policies. The information posted does state you can repeat the courses if “The replacement (repeat) course must have curriculum similar to the original course (the same content but not necessarily the same title).”
You could check into Academic renewal if you received a ‘D’ or an ‘F’ in a class that you took 2 or more years ago. You can apply for academic renewal to, in a sense, erase the grade from your record… meaning that it’ll still show up on your transcript, but won’t be factored into your GPA. Again the policies vary between schools.
Beyond these options, you can only do your best at the CC and try to mitigate the lower DE grades with exceptional CC grades.
CS is highly competitive but you do not need a 3.8 GPA for some of the UC’s and several of the Cal states which can give you a great education. CS is highly marketable so you do not need to go to a top school to do well post grad.
You can TAG to UC Merced with a 3.0 UC transferable GPA or UC Riverside with a 3.6 UC GPA. For other UC’s, you can look up the UC Transfer GPA by major and campus here: Transfers by major | University of California
Thank you so much, I only have one more question (sorry for all of the questions) there are 2 DE classes which are transferable. I got a B in one and a C in the other no +/- would I still be able to retake each? It’s allowed by the original CC I took them at after 36 months but the new grades would be averaged, but that seems to be against what these UC guidelines say since the grades I got were above a C- so I’m just wondering if I could still retake both for at least the average of each since it’s allowed by the original CC?
According to the UC repeat information, you can only retake if it is a C-, D or F. If the grade has no +/-, then you cannot retake the C nor the B course.
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