<p>I'm 23 and I have been going to community college off-and-on and have amassed 24.5 credits of fun stuff (i.e. Photography, EMT, Culinary). I am now attending Motorcycle Mechanics Institute which is a diploma based trade school and is not accredited with normal colleges/universities.</p>
<p>My plans are now to get a degree in Engineering after completing MMI, and I would like to get into an Ivy/MIT/CalTech, or the like if at all possible. But, have I shot myself in the foot by going to school already, in that I will have to finish an A.S. to apply as a transfer(which further limits my chances)? Or, is it possible to not transfer any of my credits and apply as a Freshman?</p>
<p>I did not do well in HS because I did not like homework. I ended up taking the GED after my Junior year just to get out of there, and because I didn’t have a Senior year, I did not take the SAT’s. </p>
<p>At the CC I have mostly decent grades, except for a math class I stopped attending but didn’t withdraw from. I finally decided I needed to start doing something and enrolled at MMI, and I have been maintaining a 4.0, and I’m getting involved with the student council. I have no doubt I can handle anything they throw at me. </p>
<p>I plan on studying up for, and taking SAT prep courses. I am working on some projects that will showcase why I would be a good candidate and set me apart; building a Formula-1 style car from scratch, and grafting 2 4-cylinder motorcycle engines together to make a V-8.</p>
<p>I guess my approach is going to be based on character, ability, and the recent turn around in my life. If that doesn’t work and all they care about is how I did in H.S. then they can go to hell. There is always another school. </p>
<p>And my original question was not advice for getting in, but simply; can I apply as a freshman with my background, or do I need to apply as a transfer?</p>
<p>Many colleges/universities will consider you a transfer because you have more than one semester worth of community college credits. Some won’t.</p>
<p>Given your age and your experience, you clearly fall into the “non-traditional” category. You need to take your questions directly to each college/university that you are looking at because each of them will have a unique way of evaluating your experiences. You also may find that you don’t need to take an ACT or SAT exam after all given all of your post-HS studies.</p>
<p>For some ideas, check the Transfer Forum (click on Discussion Home in the upper left of this screen and then scroll down), and the Non-Traditional Student sub-Forum (The link is at the top of this page under College Admissions).</p>
<p>Thank you for the advice. Shortly after I posted this I found what a non-traditional student is, and the sub-board. But it doesn’t seem too populated, so I figured I might get more traffic here.</p>
<p>I will make some calls and see what they have to say.</p>
<p>Scott, one more thought: Given the credits you have, you should work with the schools individually which interest you. This is a matter of what school and faculty are the best fit for you, not the name of the school. My husband started college at age 24, and enjoyed doing so. He lived off campus and worked full time while he was in school, and while you may not want to work full time with a rigorous course load, you probably don’t want to live on campus with 18 year olds!
There’s lots of brilliant, successful, happy engineers who did not attend the iconic engineering programs. I suspect you may be joining their ranks in a few years!</p>
<p>Thank you for your thoughts, nj. I understand that there are many very good option available to me, and MIT/Ivy is just a long-shot is case lightning strikes and I get accepted. Not much harm in trying the way I look at it. I’m prepared to go to whatever is the most feasible in the likely event that I don’t get in.</p>
<p>Keep in mind that the ivies are not the best schools for engineering. And frankly, don’t wrap your hopes around them or MIT, for a non traditional student with grades from an unaccredited trade school and seemingly no test scores, they are probably unrealistic. But for engineering it mostly doesn’t matter, so focus on some schools good in engineering that are more attainable. Where do you live?</p>
<p>Sounds like you should also be researching schools that are specifically good for automotive engineering which not all engineering schools have and as far as I know none of the ivies or MIT or Caltech do.</p>
<p>I do plan on doing a bit of prep work and taking SAT’s to give me some form of a ranking, and these schools are just long shot. If I make it, awesome. If not, oh well. I’ll go where I can. I’m not a Junior in HS banking everything on it.</p>
<p>I plan on going into Mechanical Engineering. Cars and bikes are my hobby, but I don’t need to be tied down to that field.</p>
<p>Often if you do what you love, you do best. There are real opportunities to reinvent the car on the horizon. In my experience someone building cars from scratch and grafting engines has a deep love of them and will enjoy a career surrounding them no end. And as they are my husband’s number 1 hobby, I know how much people in the businesses serving them can make!</p>
<p>Shoot for and apply to your reach schools. MIT, especially, likes out of the box students. You could always take the SATs to further help.
I also have noticed the non-trad board isn’t populated, but traditionaly focused students will not have good answers for you. The standards or traditional/non traditional vary widely depending on the colleges point of view.</p>