<p>I would counter with the fact that the University of California is based on a statewide holistic educational approach which was constructed with transfers in mind. So, if you want to complain…you can go to a private school I guess.</p>
<p>I think it would be a mistake to say that everyone should be tested at age 16 and discarded if not able to excel then and there. Some people are, simply, late bloomers and others are facing real issues at that age which they have to attend to.</p>
<p>All I know is, thanks to CC, I will be graduating with 0 debt, and my diploma will have the same name on it as yours. I also will have been able to bypass these supposed weeder classes. So, I ask, who really is the smarter out of us two? Obviously I don’t mean to disparage freshmen admits, I’m just pointing out that there is more than one path, and thing’s aren’t as clear-cut as they may seem.</p>
<p>Remember, the transfer option is open to you as well.</p>
<p>That’s an extreme measure that we shouldn’t have to resort to. For example, if an organization has an ineffective policy, then the best solution is to change that policy, and hopefully the organization is responsive to the concerns of its constituents to effect that change. The answer should not always be to simply never join the organization. </p>
<p>And I must give credit where credit is due: Berkeley does respond to concerns. Berkeley does make beneficial policy changes. For example, Berkeley has opened the (L&S) computer science major to all, when it used to be open to only a subset of students who had to apply through an internal transfer mechanism. Berkeley has built substantially more campus housing. Berkeley does therefore have the capacity to change. Hopefully Berkeley will change in regard to transfer vs. freshman weeders as well. </p>
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<p>The issue, again, is not about transfer students per se. I have nothing against transfers, for I agree that not everybody performs well in high school, and those students may nevertheless deserve a chance. Heck, I’ve sometimes thought that all of the Berkeley undergrad program should consist purely of transfer students.</p>
<p>The core issue is that if you are going to have dual admissions tracks, you have to ensure that they are equitable. If freshman admits are forced to take weeders, then transfer students should be forced to take the same weeders. Either that or freshman admits should be given the same opportunity to skip weeders as the transfer students are. What’s fair is fair. </p>
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<p>That is precisely the wrong way to look at the problem. The issue is not determining who is ‘smarter’ (as you say) by exploiting a weeder-less loophole. If a loophole exists in the system, the answer is not simply to have everybody game the system by exploiting the loophole, the real answer is to close the loophole.</p>
<p>Don’t confuse yourself into thinking that you are smarter because you lucked out. If you had the aptitude to foresee that going to community college could ensure you a transfer to one of the finest universities in the country, than you would be deemed intelligent enough to game the system. But we both know that you went to community college out of no other options, received a humorous 3.47 in a cake major of political science.</p>
<p>I’m sure you had some “hardship” that you wrote about in your essay, and I’m sure that the admissions officer just ate it up. But at the end of the day a 3.47 at a community college in a major that doesn’t require much skill shows a sincere lack of dedication to ones academics. It’s not deserving of studying with people who were at the top of their class in high school, received high SAT scores, AP scores, etc (which they were required to take) and showed that they were the caliber of students who could receive a world class education.</p>
<p>If I didn’t want my info out there, I wouldn’t have posted on this board. I think my situation proves my point if anything. To say I don’t “deserve” to study with you is laughable.</p>
<p>My point is, that this option is open for everybody. So it’s kinda like the guy who climbed mount Everest with a 100 lb weight on his back disparaging the guy who got up with 50. Am I supposed to be impressed that you took a more difficult path? You must feel that being a freshman admit gives you some sort of advantage, if not you have unneededly taken a more difficult path. If so, it will bear out somehow.
My point is that everybody does have the same opportunity to skip weeders. Community colleges are open to everyone, but you made the decision to spend your first two years here @ cal. Now that some realize the limited utility of that decision, they want to lash out at others for not being forced to make the same decision.</p>
<p>Now if somehow transfers came from some system you didn’t have access to, I would be a lot more sympathetic to that argument.</p>
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Ok, that was a bit of counter ■■■■■■■■. This whole thread is attacking my ilk, just throwing a little of it back at ya.</p>
<p>But you see, I did have the foresight. The plan was always to get a 3.4 and TAP into UCLA. Since Berkeley accepted me and it is a marginally better school, I went with that. If the ceiling was higher I would have met that, but it’s not so why do unneeded work? To test myself? I know my abilities, and I know that I could have easily gotten A’s in all of my classes, but once again I bring up the point of utility. I had other things going on I deemed more important. And apparently USC UCLA Cal Michigan Columbia etc deemed them more important as well.</p>
<p>It’s never good to impune someones character off of an internet post, but since we’re posting wildly inaccurate conjectures about other posters let me take a stab at it as well.</p>
<p>Don’t confuse yourself into thinking you are smarter because you got a ridiculously overinflated 6.3 GPA in one of California’s humorous failing highschools where the majority of the student body only showed up because they were mandated by state law to do so. Don’t forget about the 40 AP credits you received by taking those oh so hard exams which everyone who paid attention in class got a 4 or 5 on. Also the SAT prep classes your parents paid for which set them back on the down payments they were going to use to buy your little sister a Toyota corolla.Then you chose a major in the hard sciences due to an inability to interact with human beings. Now that you received that c+ in the organic chemistry weeder you took freshmen year and are 30k in debt unless mommy and daddy footsthe bill, you will never make it to a prestigious gradschool, over all those perfect GPA transfers leapfroging you. Since you have no life or work experience you are not deserving to compete with them in a competitive workforce environment.</p>
<p>See look, I can do that too. Point being, there is a problem with our educational system period, nobody’s hands are clean and to single out transfers is unfair. I really do love you freshmen admits.</p>
<p>While I can’t speak for others, I am not lashing out at anybody. I am simply saying that we have a loophole in the system, and that loophole ought to be fixed. It is quite the cynical and defeatist response to say that everybody should take advantage of the loophole: far more constructive to simply fix the loophole. </p>
<p>Look at it from the standpoint of the system as a whole. Everybody at Berkeley - whether freshman admits or transfers - is supposed to judged equally in whatever major they happen to be in. That goal is subverted when some students, for whatever reason, are provided a track to skip over weeders that other students are forced to take. After all, this is not a game. The purpose is not to simply find an easier way to worm through a particular major. </p>
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<p>I agree with you that nobody should be singling out transfer students, or anybody else, and for that reason, I agree with you that 123456789bc’s post was uncalled for. I also agree with you that we have a systemic problem, but that’s the point. Let’s fix the problem. </p>
<p>As I said before, either transfer students should be forced to take weeders, or frosh should be allowed to skip weeders. What’s fair is fair. After all, at the end of the day, transfer students are coming to Berkeley, so they should abide by the same rules as the other students. Nobody at Berkeley should enjoy special privileges. </p>
<p>For those who still don’t agree, let me ask a basic question. Give me a reason why transfer students should not have to skip the weeders that other students are forced to endure?</p>
<p>I think you mean “take the weeders” not “skip the weeders”.</p>
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<li>Because they took equivalent coursework at CC. Making them take the same class again is a waste of time and resources.</li>
<li>Lower division classes are crowded enough as it is.</li>
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<p>I don’t consider it a loophole at all, just a different path. I think you overestimate the strength of your weeders in comparison to the classes available at CC, but I am not a hard science major so I can only apply apples to apples.</p>
<p>Are you talking about all majors or just the hard sciences/engineering?
you completely glanced over the fact that the solution is already available. No one is forced to take “weeders” @ cal. You can take them at CC I can take them at CC.</p>
<p>Most students @ cal (or almost any university) try to worm through their major by taking the path of least resistance. We all rate my professor, course ninja, wait until the semester when the easier section is being given etc. This IS most definitely a game. You and I have different viewpoints, we are entering the land of the subjective,but the point for me is to get the degree.
If I wanted to purely learn, there are certainly more cost effective ways of doing so then attending cal. We are there for many other reasons, including prestige, accreditation, location, network building etc. Academics are important, the most important thing, but I think some of you with no work experience severely overrate its importance in the real world and are going to be eaten alive in the job market.
I agree, we should fix our public education problem, but it goes much deeper than who’s taking weeders and who isn’t. That’s a red herring.</p>
<p>I think that the navigation aspects of college, or “being smart” about class difficulty, professor effectiveness, class structure etc. Is an important part of being a good student. I’d say there’s just as much variation within berkeley as there is between berkeley and CC. I just don’t accept the “weeder” argument</p>
<p>No, you can’t. Not as a freshman-admit. That’s the point. I believe somebody else had posted the link that states that once you’re enrolled at Berkeley, you’re barred as a matter of policy from simultaneously enrolling in any other college without explicit permission from the Dean, which is granted only rarely. </p>
<p>As I’ve said before on other threads, Berkeley should immediately eliminate this rule post-haste. After all, why the heck does Berkeley care what I choose to do in my spare time? It’s my spare time, I should be able to use it as I wish; if I choose to attend another school in my free time, I should be free to do so. After all, there are plenty of other students who use their free time on far more frivolous activities. </p>
<p>But even eliminating this rule would not solve the problem, for even if you could enroll at a community college while at Berkeley, you still may not be able to count whatever credits you earn. That requires yet more approvals which are not automatically granted. </p>
<p>That’s the problem: Berkeley freshman-admits are therefore effectively barred from skipping weeders that the transfer students are allowed to skip. Now, if you say that freshman admits should be allowed to skip those weeders, then perhaps you should join me in having Berkeley change policy to allow them to do so. </p>
<p>Now, if you are simply saying, as you said before, that freshman-admits could have simply chosen not to have attended Berkeley at all as freshman but rather have gone to a community college directly in order to take advantage of a ‘transfer-only loophole’, again, that is precisely the cynical, defeatist attitude that we should decry. The constructive solution to loopholes is not that everybody should simply milk them, but rather that loopholes should be closed. </p>
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<p>Yet those are pathways available to all. In this particular case, we are talking about a path of least resistance that is only available to transfer students, who are receiving special treatment. </p>
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<p>If it’s truly equivalent, then they will have no difficulty in repeating the coursework. </p>
<p>But I actually prefer my other solution: see below. </p>
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<p>Fair enough, then the better solution is for freshman-admits to not have to take the ostensibly crowded weeders either. They should also be allowed to take those supposedly similar community college courses that the transfers use to skip the weeders. </p>
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<p>Actually, I think you’re the one who is bringing up red herrings now. Not every community college student works, and plenty of Berkeley freshman-admits do work. Work experience or lack thereof seems to have nothing to do with the topic at hand. </p>
<p>The topic at hand is, why do transfer students deserve special privileges as far as being allowed to skip weeders? If, as you say, weeders are not a particularly important problem, then there is no reason to force the freshman-admits to take weeders, especially if the transfers are not forced to do so, right? </p>
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<p>Again, if you don’t accept the weeder argument, then let’s take it off the table. Join me in endorsing a policy reform that allows freshman-admits to skip the weeders in the same way that the transfers are allowed.</p>
<p>Otherwise, again, you’re in the rather uncomfortable position of having to explain why transfers should be allowed to skip weeders when the freshman-admits are not.</p>
<p>OK I know sakky must have meant “take.” I think the reason they shouldn’t have to is time/graduation issues. If the transfer route is viable at all, then their courses they took for 2 years should count for something. Else, you’re pretty much saying transferring isn’t transferring, because you have to start off from scratch.</p>
<p>Let me comment that it HAS been the case that transfers’ courses have been reviewed to be considered unworthy to replace Cal’s own. I know this has happened, personally. Some of these have had to retake classees. I think that’s actually not fair, because it’s a very circuitous plan.</p>
<p>However, I think it is fair to say that if the rigor is in question, you have to test out of Cal’s courses by proving yourself at its final exams – and this option should be available to frosh too.</p>
<p>So basically you’re saying that if a loophole exists, people should simply exploit it to the hilt. What sort of a message is that? What’s wrong with simply closing the loophole? Why is the only available option the cynical one?</p>
<p>Exactly: when I say that transfer should have to ‘take’ weeders, I don’t mean that they should necessarily have to take the entire weeder course. If they can prove that they know the material by passing the final exam or an equivalent, then I have no problem in allowing them to skip the weeders. And that should be true of everybody, regardless of admissions path. On the other hand, if they don’t know the material, then why exactly should they be allowed to skip?</p>