Cornell University International Transfer : Do I stand a fighting chance?

Transfer Students
1

<p>Hello. I am a Korean freshman student who spent just one semester in my college. I have several questions about the transfer process of ILR school. I have a plan to apply for ILR as a transfer student for fall semester next year. ( Any information would be appreciated!)</p>

<p>My particulars:</p>

<p>College
GPA - 4.5 out of 4.5 (Rank : 1/127) : Straight A+s in 18 credits.
Extracurriculars : Vouluteer tutoring for 2 months in my first semester.
Summer English programme for 40 days in summer vacation
(Graduated with top 10%)
Classes taken : Management, Calculus, Statistics, Logistics (All introductory courses)</p>

<p>High School
GPA - Valedictorian (1/512 or 2/512 I think so...)
Extracurricualrs : About 100 hours volunteer works in a hospital
Founder of School English newspaper
Interships on Kids English newspaper</p>

<p>*I have a gap year between college and HS, because it is not surprise for Korean students to have a gap year to have a better score in Korean SAT in order to enter more prestigious school. I am a bit worried how Cornell Admission Officers would think of this...</p>

<p>Questions:</p>

<p>(1)Which extracurricular activities should I do? I was thinking of a volunteering tutor, but I realized that this EC was not related to ILR field.... What would you recommend me to do?</p>

<p>(2) DO the classes I have taken in my current college affect a lot when admission officers make decisions? I have taken introduction courses of statistics, management,calculus, and logistics. In order to impress admission officers, which course should I take for the next semester?</p>

<p>(3)Do international students who wish to transfer to the ILR school have as much chance to be accepted as the american students do? or Any information about international transfer to Cornell University would be appreciated.
According to the post I found here in College Confidential(<a href="http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/cornell-university/161001-ilr-transfer-rate.html%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/cornell-university/161001-ilr-transfer-rate.html&lt;/a&gt;)
the real transfer acceptance rate for ILR was about 30%, which sounded hopeful to me not until I realized that IVY League schools are relatively closed to international students. And I think it is safe to assume that in transfer admission, the chances of accptance would decrease for international students because the schools do not believe that foreign instituions do good jobs on educating their students.</p>

<p>(4)I have no SAT scores at all, since my high school was not an international school which is for students who wished to apply for American colleges. Do I have to bother to take it?</p>

<p>Sorry for a long post. I wish you the readers the best luck for your future. Thank you!!</p>

2

<p>I would chose the most challenging classes that you can excell in. </p>

<p>Students take gap years all the time… I wouldn’t worry about it.</p>

<p>If the SAT is required (it will be on Cornell’s website) then you will have to take it. I believe that in the past Brown didn’t require taking the SAT if one never took it in high school.</p>

3

<p>to answer your questions:

  1. ILR-related ECs are important, but you should also do some things that you enjoy. if there is an economics club, history club, finance club, etc, then consider those
  2. yes. they want you to have completed certain classes, which are listed on the ILR website. they give preference to students who have these completed, so i would sign up for the ones that you don’t have done.
  3. yes, but financial aid is harder to get. that 30% transfer rate that you’re reading is inflated a great deal by internal transfers and guaranteed transfers, so it’s lower than that for true externals.
  4. i believe that ILR is SAT-optional for transfers, but they will require the TOEFL. you should double check this on the website</p>

<p>as for everything else, your grades are great and so you have the numbers (minus the pending issue of the SAT thing). this means you just need to write really good essays and you will definitely be in the running. good luck!</p>

4

<p>Ironicallyunsure is, as always, completely correct, but I want to add something to answer your third question more completely.</p>

<p>The ~30% rate for “true” external transfers has probably somewhat come down as has the quoted rate (48ish percent compared to apparently 64% in 2006). You could always ask them-- I found the office staff quite helpful to me during my application process. </p>

<p>As far as the application process goes, the best advice I can give you is to write essays that really, really emphasize your strengths and how they apply to the ILR school while talking about what you think you can get from ILR. If you feel that you’re a good fit for ILR, you probably are pretty passionate about the school. Try to let that come through in your interview/essays. Feel free to PM me if you have any questions!</p>

5

<p>Sorry for hijacking this but I’m from India and currently enrolled at the State University of New York at Buffalo (Electrical Engineering) on a full ride Presidential Scholarship (Honors College). I’ve managed a 4.0 GPA along with some decent EC’s (quizzing, leadership, writing etc.) and I have killer professor recommendations. I want to apply for Spring transfer to Cornell School of Engineering. Incidentally, I was rejected by Cornell when applying after high school. My questions are:

  1. Do I have a chance for getting into the College of Engineering (yes I know the transfer acceptance for Engineering is like 6%) and
  2. Am I eligible for financial aid? I’ve heard the transfers are need blind as well; is this true? </p>

<p>My HS stats:
GPA: well Indian schools don’t have GPAs and stuff but I got my 10th grade central exam results evaluated by an American evaluation service and they sent me a cert saying I have an equivalent of a 4.0 in the exam but they couldn’t convert my school grades into GPA :confused:
SAT I: 2160 (M:800, CR:690, W:670)
SAT II: 760 (Math IIC), 740 (Phy)
Valedictorian (one of 5; yes my high school was weird)
ECs: VP School Council, Quiz Society, lots of state level quizzes won and a national level quiz too, various Science symposia, Poetry publications, many other misc academic awards</p>

<p>PS: Can you tell me some good engineering schools that offer financial aid to international transfers?</p>

6

<p>^ 1. cornell engineering took spring transfers for the first time this year and i believe they took literally 1 or 2 people (i know 1 personally, the other i have only heard about). i’m not sure if they’re going to continue this or not, so you should definitely call and ask
2. yes if you’re domestic. it’s not need-blind for internationals</p>

<p>i’m not sure of engineering schools that offer aid to internationals, but you could try some others like purdue and see what happens. if cooper union takes transfers, then you’d be set</p>

7

<p>if cooper union takes transfers, then you’d be set</p>

<p>Yeah but they only take something like 15 for engineering. Okay forget about financial aid. At what other colleges (Public Ivy’s, maybe Columbia?) do you think I could get in?</p>

8

<p>

</p>

<p>Cornell is need-blind for internationals, although they don’t guarantee to meet need.</p>

<p><a href=“https://www.finaid.cornell.edu/finaid/upload/Financial-Aid-for-Undergraduate-International-Students.pdf[/url]”>https://www.finaid.cornell.edu/finaid/upload/Financial-Aid-for-Undergraduate-International-Students.pdf&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

9

<p>Unless Cornell changed something in the past year, they are not need-blind for international transfers. They are need-blind for international freshman applicants.</p>

10

<p>I don’t know how this slipped my mind:
<a href=“http://admissions.cornell.edu/downloads/TATAScholarship.pdf[/url]”>http://admissions.cornell.edu/downloads/TATAScholarship.pdf&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>To receive the undergraduate scholarship, a recipient must:
• be a citizen of India and have attended secondary school in
India;
• be offered admission to Cornell as an undergraduate student;
• be eligible for need-based financial aid.</p>

<p>I believe an Indian freshman this year got 95% aid through this. I’m hoping that an admitted undergrad student includes transfers?</p>

11

<p><em>Bumpity bump</em></p>