tldr; not too sure if I should apply for transfers. Tips for freshman transfers, especially from Canada
Hey,
I’m a freshman at a Canadian university; it’s up there in Canada especially for business. I applied to U.S. colleges last year and got rejected/waitlisted by all of the ones I was willing to pay the money to go to, but now that I realize I want to work in finance in the U.S., studying in an American college would be preferable. I did quite well in high school and I heard some people do well with transfers, but I’m not sure if it’s worth putting in the time and hundreds of dollars into applying this year again. Do I have a remote chance or should I just not bother?
SAT: 1550/1600 770 on reading/writing and 780 on math
IB: 44/45
First semester college GPA: Probably 4.0, I think around a 95-96% average
I do research for the bigger clubs at my university that are very finance-heavy, and I perform with the university symphony orchestra. I won a national award for a business competition in high school, co-founded an NPO twith a few thousand followers on social media, was concertmaster for two highschool orchestras, and was editor-in-chief of the school paper. To b honest nothing too spectacular, but I’m hoping my complete focus on finance will have improved my chances from last year when my application essays were very wishy-washy because I had no clue what I wanted to do.
I plan on spinning all my application material to my passion for finance and how my experiences in the first semester of college made me realize how much I want to work in the industry. If I do apply, I plan on applying to some liberal arts colleges like Williams/Amherst, as well as NYU Stern and maybe a couple Ivys. If anyone has insight into how tough transfers to U.S. colleges are, or any thoughts on how I could improve my chances, I would appreciate it.
Short answer is that transferring into US colleges and universities that are prestigious for finance is going to be extraordinarily difficult. Are you certain of your finances? US schools rarely give good aid for transfers or for international students. So international transfers will be doubly hobbled. You can look at the Common Data Sets for each of the schools that interest you to see what the transfer numbers are.
A better path (IMO) would be to finish your undergraduate degree at your well regarded Canadian university with tippy top marks while undertaking some finance related internships or other projects. Then leverage that, along with some killer recommendations, into a place at a top graduate or MBA program at one of the prestigious US finance schools.
Applying to the same schools that denied you last year will likely result in the same decision after one semester of university work. Your stats are tip top so your multiple denials were likely due to your essays, EC’s or lack thereof. Were you as focused on finance in your freshman application? That would not likely have made a good impression on LAC’s and the Ivies, except perhaps Penn Wharton.
Top 20 American universities are generally not that welcoming to transfer students.
I wasn’t as focused on finance in my freshman apps, and I actually thought this was a negative for me, because my extracurriculars/essays were all over the place in terms of my goals/interests. For instance, one of my essays mentioned my passion for violin, NPOs, and entrepreneurship all in the same paragraph because I had no clue what I was doing.
My “story” is to explain how I leveraged my knack for writing that I had from high school to quickly learn about finance in my first semester and become fully engaged with the business community at my university. My complete commitment to finance and the tangible, somewhat-professional research/work I’ve done with people who have worked in big firms would be the differentiating factor between last year’s rejections and potentially transferring in this year. Would you say Ivies and LACs have bad impressions of students looking to pursue finance?
I’ve done some research about some universities that are more accepting of transfers (Cornell, for instance) to improve my chances. I’ll look into how the numbers differ for international students.
University data shows typically around 1/5 of transfers come from community colleges. Presumably this includes both those with articulation agreements and those without them.
Internationals typically constitute about 5% of matriculated transfer students, with the max in recent years of about 8%. No information on comparative acceptance rate for them though.
If you happen to play hockey at a professional level, you could perhaps join the rest of your fellow countrymen on the Cornell hockey team (and at Cornell AEM)