<p>I am currently a junior and choosing what universities I want to apply to. I want to know if I should go to community college then transfer instead of going straight to university after I graduate?</p>
<p>From what I’ve heard if your grades are bad and you aren’t going to be able to get into the college that you want then you should go to community college or if you can’t afford to start at the University. IMO however I think it is best to start at a University because of how hard it is to transfer in and classes not counting as well as Community College not being challenging enough for college. But then again it really depends on YOUR circumstances. Since we know nothing about you it is hard to offer you advice as to what you should do but I would definately go straight to a university.</p>
<p>Sophmore Weighted GPA: 3.5714
Class Rank: Top 50% out of 800
Born in Puerto Rico, but both of my parents are Chinese. My family didn’t attend college. I attended a private school in Puerto Rico for many years. Moved to Houston after freshman year. Currently, I attend in a public school which is ranked #403 by Newsweek Top 1500 High Schools in America. My GPA is low because I didn’t get straight As during freshman year and in my transcript when I was switching schools didn’t show that I was in all honors. And I think my old school was based on a 4.0 scale and my new school is based on a 5.0 scale. After I switched, the school was a lot different than my old school. I was able to choose my own classes, but my counselor didn’t really help me pick them. I was new to the whole Pre-AP/AP because my old school didn’t offer it because the teachers would chooose either you were going to regular or honors and the counselors didn’t tell me much about it so during sophmore year most of my classes were academic. Right now, most of my classes are Pre-AP/AP but I am not sure if I will get a 5.0 on them because I didn’t do very good on the finals. I just googled about which GPA the colleges will see in my application and it said junior year. I am probably going to take AP/Honor classes during summer to raise my GPA and hopefully will get top 25% by the time I graduate. I want to get at least a Master’s in something related to computers. I will post more information about me.</p>
<p>“I attend in a public school which is ranked #403 by Newsweek Top 1500 High Schools in America.”</p>
<p>yeah, i looked at those rankings once and laughed at how off they were in regards to the schools in my area. my school wasn’t ranked, but another school in the area was even though we have higher average standardized test scores, higher graduation rates and an exemplary ranking by the state of texas. why these weren’t factored in the school rankings…</p>
<p>“IMO however I think it is best to start at a University because of how hard it is to transfer in and classes not counting as well as Community College not being challenging enough for college.”</p>
<p>maybe i’ve just been extremely lucky, but i had no trouble transferring classes. and community college classes are pretty hit or miss when it comes to difficulty. some are just ridiculously easy, meanwhile others are reasonably challenging if your teacher and/or the subject matter is hard. </p>
<p>since you live in texas, i’d probably just spend a year or two at a cc and then try to transfer to ut or a&m. both schools take in a lot of transfer from ccs and they should accept most, if not all, of your transfer credits.</p>
<p>I don’t know why you are already considering CC if its not for the financial reasons.</p>
<p>I am considering CC because I want to get into a better school than what I will be able to with the high school record. I really want to go to UT-Austin, but I was planning to apply to A&M because I would have a higher chance. </p>
<p>Freshman PSAT: around 102
Sophmore PSAT: around 121
Hopefully junior PSAT score that I will get next week is around 160. I am also starting to read the BB book.
My goal is to get around 2000 on the SAT.</p>
<p>Be very careful with the community college strategy. A book last year by a former president of Princeton highlighted a lot of facts, one of which was bright students who attend a community college become about 36% less likely to ever see a bachelor’s degree. I see that in a lot of students that I work with. They’re bright and the less stimulating environment of a CC really hurts them. By the time they get to me I have to explain to their parents that the CC strategy was probably a planning mistake. When I link them with a 4-year school, they do much better. If you want to go the CC route as a precursory step, just be very clear and disciplined on why you’re there. Otherwise, you may get discouraged and leave.</p>
<p>*I am currently a junior and choosing what universities I want to apply to. I want to know if I should go to community college then transfer instead of going straight to university after I graduate? *</p>
<p>If you have any interest in getting any merit scholarships, then don’t go to a cc first. The biggest and best merit scholarships are for incoming freshmen to universities. </p>
<p>Transfer scholarships are more rare and are usually small.</p>
<p>IF you want merit scholarships, apply to schools that give them, and pay attention to deadlines.</p>
<p>Do you know how much your parents can spend each year on your college education?</p>
<p>I teach at a CC and for students who are motivated and have targeted a top state U that they could not get into with their high school credentials, the community college can be a great alternative. There is a good deal of misinformation/confusion about the quality of students/instructors in community colleges. Community colleges serve both university transfer and vocational education (nursing, engineering tech, police academy, etc) and there is an overlap in some courses for the two populations. For example the first freshman english course is taken by both but the second course divides the two into different courses (UT for one, voc in the other). I imagine when you lump the voc students with the UT, a bright UT can be bored. It is easy to see how statistics can be misleading or inaccurate, particularly if the two populations are not separated out for analysis.</p>
<p>The community college quality depends on the location of the school and the state. Florida and California have great systems. I teach in NC and we are in the top 10. We feed into UNC Chapel Hill with excellent results (average CC transfer GPA at UNC is a 3.3). UNC respects us and has developed a transfer portal called “Carolina Covenant” where the CC students receive advice, support and financial assistance during their tenure at UNC. There are many great students now at UNC that would have been rejected straight out of high school due to having stats like the op.</p>
<p>More than half of our students are “reverse transfers”-bombed out in a four year and are rebuilding with us. Most of these students do not feel that we are inferior. I feel a student gets a better education with us than with a lower tier state school. As to engagement, I disagree with ssppgh. I spend hours with my students helping them develop transfer plans. Many who enter the mid-tier four year schools return to tell me that my classes were harder and more detailed. My office suite mates both have PhD’s from respected universities. I would much rather take intro biology or english from either of them than a 22 year old TA.</p>
<p>If the OP has access to a good CC system, why not? Some schools do offer scholarships to transfer students but not at the level they do entering freshmen. A surprising number of private colleges have given my best students (GPA of 3.7 or better) great scholarship packages. Some universities want the top cc students. Durham Tech, a CC in Durham NC is quite proud of the fact that several graduates have matriculated at DUKE!</p>
<p>*A surprising number of private colleges have given my best students (GPA of 3.7 or better) great scholarship packages. *</p>
<p>Which schools are these and how much did they get? I know that some privates give $10k-15k scholarships to CC transfers, but if the COA is $50k-55k per year (so, the student still has to pay $40k per year), then that is only a good deal IF the student couldn’t have gotten a better scholarship to a university as an incoming freshman.</p>
<p>For instance…if at a public (or private), the same student could have gotten free tuition as an incoming freshman, then all he’d have to pay for is room, board, books, and misc (usually no more than $15k per year).</p>
<p>So, it all depends on the stats of the high school student. I’d hate to see any high school student with high stats go right to a CC only to find out later that he could have gotten a better scholarship as an incoming freshmen.</p>
<p>i was wondering about going back to cc and then go back to private university to save some money. I am a sophomore now i was wondering if it would be wise going to thre-four different schools and having it on you resume. Would it look bad for employers(particularly management consulting,business)</p>
<p>Mom of two, I agree with you that it would be wrong for a top student who was offered a free ride as a freshman or even a substantial amount of free money opt for a cc. I was working with the gpa given by the op (3.5) and class rank (upper 50%). Those stats would not allow access to a highly competitive flagship state school or yield a scholarship to a top private (unless she was national merit -doesn’t seem likely with her PSAT- or if she had an amazing sport or talent that the school wanted).</p>
<p>If I am reading her correctly, she wants to obtain admission to a higher tier school than she currently has credentials for. She does have many options with lower tier schools but it didn’t sound like that was what she wants to me.</p>
<p>Most of the private schools my students transfer to get scholarships in the range of 5-15K. The schools are not as expensive as what you quote (36-45 range) and it could be that privates (with the exception of top ones like Duke, Vandy, Wake and Davidson) are cheaper in my part of the world. The CC students often qualify for grants from the colleges that are need based (the majority of my students are very middle class or working class- adjusted gross incomes under 110,000, more in the 50-80 range if assessed based on parent income). Some of my students are young adults independent of family and get Pell money in addition to the school grants and scholarships. Some of my students, because they have a low EFC, can go as cheaply as they would to a state school. I also have students that live at home and attend the private school. These are often married students or those who have higher EFCs but really want the smaller, private college. What are the students carry in terms of debt loads? It ranges from very little to 15K a year not covered (at some of the privates).</p>