<p>Help! My freshman daughter is miserable at Lehigh and complains she wants to transfer. She has, as far as I know, looked at a couple of websites and checked on College ******* but is refusing to sit down and do the research. I have told her about this site and collegereview but she tells me to "calm down." I know I need to let her do the work but I am afraid if I don't "guide" this effort nothing will happen and she will just leave her top-tier school. I know I should keep mum but she is not a self-starter (although she does well academically) and I am worried. As I said, Help!</p>
<p>Some of the schools have really early transfer deadlines. You might want to tell her that. Some are not until March/April, but I remember S getting shut out of a few because he missed deadlines. He wound up staying put, by the way. Maybe your daughter will have a better 2nd semester.</p>
<p>If she wants it bad enough, she'll do the work. The only thing I would do is to give her a guideline on how much you would be willing to pay, and maybe what kind of school you would be willing to fund.</p>
<p>i agree, if she is truly miserable at Lehigh, she'll get around to doing the work.</p>
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I am afraid if I don't "guide" this effort nothing will happen and she will just leave her top-tier school.
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<p>Well, maybe you want to head that off at the pass by telling her that -- while you're in favor of her transfering if that's what she wants -- she must attend some school until she graduates.</p>
<p>My D didn't decide to look into transfering until January. She spent some time researching, but it went pretty quick because she had a much better idea of what she wanted, and didn't want. Deadlines for the schools she was interested in were in earlyto mid-March. She got it all done on time, even with the late start. I did help with legwork like getting SATs sent and getting HS transcripts. </p>
<p>I agree with others; if she wants to leave enough, she will get the stuff done. I don't agree though, that you can insist she be in school somewhere. You can insist that she goes to school or works, if she's living at home.</p>
<p>My D was talking about transferring from when she started CC but I didn't see much action. I let her be in charge & told her I'd pay app fees etc., but didn't bug her much. She also is NOT a self-starter & wasn't very happy at her CC. She did put in one app, just after the app but got the adcom to forgive the time difference so it was "on time." She had planned to submit additional apps but never got around to it. She didn't hear much from the school so assumed the worst but was surprised by a letter in late July that she was accepted as a transfer, entering Jan of 09. We have all been pleasantly surprised that they'll accept most of her CC courses as transfer credits.</p>
<p>We made it clear to D that we supported her in transferring or staying at CC but SHE was in charge. It has worked for us so far.</p>
<p>Since she is a first year student this year, she could probably go to community college next year. Community colleges have late deadlines.</p>
<p>Maybe you could help her apply to your in-state flagship by getting the paperwork together for her. The state flagship is usually a good back-up option.</p>
<p>(If she is not interested in working on a variety of transfer applications to different schools of interest, maybe she is thinking that by the end of the year she will want to stay at Lehigh, or maybe she is thinking she needs a year off of college. Talk to her!)</p>
<p>If she has the research done...then all that is left is submitting the application materials. If she wants this THAT much....she'll get it done. If not, she won't. </p>
<p>We were stinkers...we helped organize the FIRST college search...and we hoped it turned out fine (it did in our cases). But we told our kids that transferring was on their dime (application fees, etc), and they had to do the leg work. Ditto grad school. We helped ONCE.</p>
<p>Back in the dark ages...I transferred also. I didn't get it all together until sometime in February or March. It all worked out fine. My parents didn't even know I was considering transferring until all was done.</p>
<p>Transfer applications are not easy. You have to get certifications from your college dean's office (and actually figure out who to ask etc) and get references from professors. As a freshman, sometimes it's hard to find a prof who actually knows who you are much less thinks highly of you. You have to line up official transcripts, besides submitting all the transcripts from the high school and all the stuff from the first round.....</p>
<p>"Transfer applications are not easy. You have to get certifications from your college dean's office (and actually figure out who to ask etc) and get references from professors. As a freshman, sometimes it's hard to find a prof who actually knows who you are much less thinks highly of you. You have to line up official transcripts, besides submitting all the transcripts from the high school and all the stuff from the first round....."</p>
<p>Very true, BUT all this^^ is a good learning experience for students, especially if their parents did a a lot of the college application busy work[ guilty as charged]</p>
<p>I'd let her do the work. If she doesn't, then she can continue where she is, take a year off, go to a CC, or some other option. When my daughter went through this, I did two things. I made sure she found out when the application deadlines were, and I made the call to her high school for transcripts to be sent because we knew it would take a lot of phone tag to make sure it got done. </p>
<p>One consideration for both of you is the FAFSA. This often needs to be done early in the year, I think.</p>
<p>I agree with others. If she really wants to transfer, she'll do the work.
If she truly hates where she is, she'll find a way of transfering. If she's ambivalent, she won't.
She may be using you as a place to vent when things don't go well, but otherwise she may be very happy where she is.
Many freshmen are not that happy first semester in college because of normal adjustment problems. Second semester, they are more comfortable with college in general, have more of a sense about what activities make them happy and how to avoid things that don't, and then they may be perfectly happy at their college.</p>
<p>About 8 yrs ago, DD(oldest child) came home for fall break and application packets followed.(that was back in the day!) We also gave her guidelines financially and she had to be in school somewhere, but she was on her own. We did not help her at all(except sign the check for her college applications). She was also at a very good private school. By the end of the first semester, she was much happier and the transition was made, but not smoothly! She happily graduated in 05! S1 was a transfer(with same guidelines), but he missed an application deadline and had to attend another small college in town for a semester(both schools worked together on what would transfer to help keep him on track). H and I thought it was important for the kids to be accountable for their own schooling experiences, we've already been to college. It's part of the learning experience.</p>
<p>I wonder if she was 'miserable at Lehigh' or 'miserable at her first semester of college' - i.e. that reality hit home once she was there but that the experience might have been about the same regardless of where she went. This happens to some students at all colleges. If she's realizing this then maybe that's why she's not so motivated to actually transfer. Otherwise, I agree with the other posters - if she's motivated enough she'll get busy with the process. It wouldn't hurt to remind her of deadlines and the financial commitment you're willing to make.</p>
<p>I helped my kids a lot in their college application process. I prodded them along, reminded them, nagged them and was proactive in many ways. This was my "Swan Song" to them. Anything else, programs abroad, exchange programs, grad school, transfers, summer classes, etc was on their head.</p>
<p>As active as I was with my kids in helping them get their apps to their colleges, I made sure that they were the primary on every aspect of the process. I wanted them to be able to do the whole thing themselves after going through the procedures. It was also prep for all the other apps that they may have to do in life without me. So I made sure that they were in on the entire thing and did everything themselves with myself being in the background encouraging (and nagging and screaming and threatening) them.</p>
<p>My D voiced ideas about transferring, and after my initial anxiety, I began to wonder how much my involvement in the prior year, contributed to her adjustment difficulties. Thanks to various things on CC, I told her abort or limits, told leer of the rapidly approaching "flagship" deadlines, and about other opportunities far transfer, i.e. after sophomore year. Then I waited, processed my own feelings, was quite okay with her "doing nothing about it ", and she is planning to apply to be an RA next year!</p>
<p>^^ Did you type that on your iphone? :)</p>
<p>I don't think this is necessarily an either/or question. Many more kids think about transferring than apply to transfer, and more apply to transfer than transfer. So, even if you don't take a complete no-help-from-mom hard line, it seems wise to wait until your daughter gets up a head of steam and actually starts doing things before offering to help, and it seems even wiser to wait until she asks you for help before doing anything. Whatever ambivalence she feels is for her to work out, not for her mom to resolve for her by pushing a transfer.</p>
<p>If it is an either/or question, then I vote with everyone else: stay out of it.</p>
<p>"^^ Did you type that on your iphone? "</p>
<p>I wish! I "wrote" it on my tablet!.....sorry!</p>