It sure helps these students but what’s in it for these colleges? Good students who can’t get into or afford top colleges are more likely to go to other colleges on merit scholarships, not community colleges. They reject far more better applicants and then pick up some transfers who are more than likely needing aid and acclimatizing in university environment on top of that.
It’s all about supply and demand. They lose a certain number of students in certain disciplines, they want to fill their seats with some kids proven to do well in college in those fields. They want to keep the graduating class size within certain numbers.
I also do not think the transfer accept %s are shockingly high
That makes sense. It sucks for better students who couldn’t get in and had to go to less selective colleges but helps community college students who would never have qualified on merit as freshman to any good college and obviously fill up college’s empty slots and keep less popular departments going. On paper it can be shown as college’s compassion for less privileged.
Also, community college students have to transfer to complete a BA. So there isn’t any “bad fit, didn’t work out with college x” risk to them.
And it is an effective way to get low income but high achieving kids (or veterans and somewhat older students) .
Question: Anyone know which elite takes the most transfers (as a % of the class)? I assume one of the UCs, but in the private LAC/U world? Seems with very high retention rates (and in some cases 4 year housing requirement or guarantee) there isn’t a lot of room for transfers, at most “elites”.
Don’t know off the top of my head, one would have to check the CDSs. Cornell probably takes the most in absolute numbers, not sure about %.
Regarding the original premise of this thread, not all “elite” colleges emphasize community college transfers. https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2018/2/4/transfer-students/ suggests that Harvard does not (their example transfer students came from USMA, Wake Forest, Georgetown, Oxford, UPenn, even though a community college transfer student, if one existed, would make the story more interesting).
For Stanford and Princeton, non-traditional students seem to be among their targets for transfer student recruitment and admission. Non-traditional students commonly get their start in community college.
Probably one of USC (probably due to being in California, where it is not hard to get strong students among community college transfer applicants), Cornell (at least for the semi-public contract divisions), and Columbia (General Studies division for what it defines as non-traditional students).
That assumes that the college’s business model plans for equal size frosh/soph/junior/senior classes. Not all colleges’ business models are planned that way. The California public universities business models assume high junior level transfer intake (about a third of graduates are supposed to be students who started at community colleges), for example. Cornell’s contract colleges and Columbia’s General Studies division are probably similar.
The data set is also tiny with ~12 transfers per year.
Also note that, aside from the low number of transfers (13 in the last cycle), Princeton only recently started accepting transfer applications, having eliminated them in 1990.
Cornell, like the UCs and some others, have articulation agreements to offer guaranteed transfer. The better question, without getting into debate on definitions such as “elite,” is which private college has the most transfers without articulation agreements. Obviously one can look at the CDS, but someone perhaps has already pulled the numbers.
Yale and Rice take some CC transfers.
Absolute number of new transfers in a recent year:
USC: 1,448 https://admission.usc.edu/wp-content/uploads/Transfer-Profile-18_19.pdf
Cornell: 645 http://irp.dpb.cornell.edu/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/CDS_2018-2019_v5.pdf
Columbia: no CDS or other information published
For USC, 49% of new transfers came from California community colleges, 30% were scions/legacies, and 28% were first generation to college, but very few were military related (22 veterans, 2 active, 4 reserve or NG, 10 dependent).
Not all transfers get decent aid, if any. Depends on the college.
Agree with ski that the only real power in applying from a cc is when there’s a guaranteed transfer policy in place. Otherwise, it’s not as simple as supply and demand. There are still standards and applicants from other 4 year schools. It’s not a matter of “sloppy seconds.”
I always saw a GT opportuity as a public service of sorts. Accept the most qualified, let others transfer to to other state schools.
Not all students at community colleges are there because they “would never have qualified on merit to any good college”. People have financial and other reasons for being at a community college - particularly non-traditional students. But hey, glad you’re able to voice your obvious prejudice towards community college students.
@sylvan8798 Any high achiever should be able to get merit or aid at some 4 year college so it’s not a bias, just a fact. However, I understand there are exceptions, personal/family issues and bigger hurdles for many but we are taking about majority here. Majority of CC doesn’t qualify for selective colleges.
That simply isn’t true that any high achiever can get merit aid to afford a 4 year college. Many families still can’t afford the cost of room and board even if they have full tuition merit. I know plenty of people who went the CC route so they could live at home for two years and save money. Not everyone has the luxury of a 4 year school close enough to do that.
And it’s also ‘just a fact’ that the majority /all? merit colleges do not meet full need. There are few true full rides out there.
Of course, if enough such high achievers decide that (for example) PVAMU full rides are desirable, PVAMU may stop offering them or make them harder to get to avoid blowing out it’s budget (why full rides have become less common than before).
Sometimes even a full COA scholarship isn’t enough. The family is dependent upon them either for income or labor.
I can’t understand why the OP is so bothered that a small number (yes it is a small number) of students transfer from cc to “elite colleges”. And how the OP assumes other students are more qualified…
Whythese threads, in the first place?
I found this thread educational. I didn’t realize that Cornell (or Columbia) had so many community college transfers. I always assumed transfers into elite private schools were like once in a blue moon.
For some such colleges, like HYPS, the yearly transfer intake is a few dozen at most. But USC, Cornell, and Columbia have different business models.