Well today I was rejected from my dream school, Cornell. I wasn’t super upset because it was a big reach. I made a thread the other day about my admission experience being, “rough,” but I was wrong. I was successful to be accepted to all of my target and safety schools. I will be attending Binghamton University only because of financial issues. I would much rather attend Syracuse or Fordham but it is over 40k per year at each. I understand Binghamton is a good school, but I have visited, and I have to be honest I cannot see myself there for a full four years. I will give a chance considering it will be my school for at least a year if not two, but now that I have been rejected by Cornell I would like to focus on transferring to a better school with better fit for myself at some point.
I just want to make it clear that I don’t mean to bash Bing in anyway, I just don’t think it will be for me based off of when I visited. In high school my GPA will Finish at a 3.7 after this final semester, my SAT is an 1830 (1240 CR+M).
Will this hurt my application even if I succeed my first semester of college. I am interested in applying to transfer to the following colleges. I understand that these schools are very selective but I want to get an idea of what it will take to get an acceptance. Aside from ILR at Cornell I would apply to major in Economics
Cornell ILR (doesnt require SAT)
University of Notre Dame
Duke University
University of Virginia
Carnegie Mellon University
Emory University
Try to make Bing work. It’s a great school and it’s affordable. School is what you make of it. That said if you don’t like it after a year or two then that’s the time to assess transfer options. Don’t worry about that now.
Go there for a year and see if you like it. Who knows, it may be a good fit for you.
If you’re there and find you can’t stand it, then start looking at other options. Worst case scenario, you won’t get accepted or the tuition will be too high and you’ll graduate from a respectable 4 year uni. Just remember that transfers have it harder than freshman - we don’t get as much aid and it’s difficult to make sure credits transfer and all that. Keep your GPA high (above 3.8) and you’ll have a good chance, though look at the stats for transfers at the schools you’re interested in.
Go into your college with an open mind and with the mindset that you will make it work and stay for all four years. There are a couple of reasons for that.
Chief among them is that you run the risk of turning this into a self-fulfilling prophecy. You feel like Bing is not for you, therefore you - consciously or unconsciously - look for confirmation of your predisposition towards the school. Maybe you withdraw from activities and friends because in your mind you’ll only be there one year.
The second reason, though, is that transferring into top universities is very difficult - much more difficult than getting in as an freshman. If you applied to any of these schools as a freshman and were not admitted, you run very low odds of getting in as a transfer. I’m sure you’re aware that your SAT scores are below average for all of those schools. I know Cornell ILR doesn’t require them so things may be different there. In my (admittedly limited) experience working with transfer students at top schools, they tend to transfer from peer schools more for fit issues than they did from non-peer schools because they were trying to “step up”.
Thirdly, if $40K per year is too much for you now to go to Syracuse or Fordham, you may be in the same boat next year even if you did get admitted to any of the schools. Many schools that meet full need for freshman applicants don’t meet full need for transfers.
I think you should give it a chance and stay there for at least a year or two and then you can take a look at transferring. A quick tip though: You say Bing doesn’t fit your needs and you want to transfer, don’t go through that year at Bing with the mindset of transferring because you will end up focusing on the wrong things. You may find a different perspective once you actually incorporate into Bing and thinking about transferring in a year may prevent you from enjoying what could possibly end up being a good college experience, you just never know.
Give Bing a try with an open mind and forget the idea of transferring for now. Just enjoy your freshman experience in college and if after a year comes and you still don’t feel like it is working out, then look at transferring options
