<p>Sorry for reposting the thread. I don't know how to move my thread from the Transfer Students forum to the UC Transfers forum so I just posted the link here to the original thread from the Transfer Students forum.</p>
<p>BS, you’re plenty smart.</p>
<p>I’m going to try and motivate you by saying you have absolutely no shot of ever finishing a BS in game design if you can’t earn a 3.0+ GPA in GE classes at CC.</p>
<p>Now, feel free to prove me wrong and quote my post in your autobiography when you are the next great game designer–I just don’t see it happening.</p>
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<p>So if I go to a new CC and complete all the classes there for the AA that are heavy in math and programming and get 3.0+, would I still have a chance to get into UCSC’s game design or would my crappy GPA and transcript from the old CC hold me back? That’s what I’m wondering. The Game Design major at UCSC doesn’t recommend and doesn’t require IGETC but during my 5 years at the old CC I spent most of my time trying to fulfill the IGETC requirements at the time since I was undecided about my major. Most of the classes of my old crappy transcript were those IGETC type classes. The only classes on that old transcript that counts toward fulfilling the prerequisite classes to be accepted into the Game Design major at UCSC is Calc 1-3, which I got C’s on all three. I got 16 more classes to take if I want to get an AA at the new CC, and the AA program at the new CC is specifically recommended by UCSC John Baskin Engineering School.</p>
<p>I know my old transcript shows I’m pretty lame cuz I couldn’t get 3.0+ on the IGETC classes during 5 years but I have my personal reasons as to why (let’s just say I came from hell and back) I got such low marks, which I’ll not explain in full detail here but which I could explain in the personal statement if I were ever to apply in the future. Would a good explanation on the personal statement increase my chances of being accepted into UCSC/UCI? But if I do well enough at the new CC and finished with a 3.0+ GPA with an AA in 2-3 years, will UCSC or UCI still accept me? Or am I still doomed because of my poor performance on the IGETC classes at my old CC, whose transcript I’m sure they’ll still look at? If this is a complete waste of time, I’ll just go to CSU I guess…</p>
<p>You have a 2.69 GPA with a failed course. If you retake that course, you could easily pull your GPA up. UCSC TAG requires a 3.00 GPA, so if you can get your overall GPA to 3.00 and finish your transfer requirements, you will be guaranteed admission.</p>
<p>I was once in a worse situation than you are in currently. I had about 60 units with a 2.5 GPA during my first 2 years, and none of them were D’s or F’s, so I couldn’t replace any of them. Over the past 2 years, I pulled that 2.5 to a 3.5, and I will be slightly over 3.6 by the end of this Fall, which will be my 5th year at CC.</p>
<p>I’m assuming you don’t know about TAG, so talk to a counselor or just google TAG, TAG UCSC, or TAG/whatever UC you wish to attend (other than Berkeley/LA).</p>
<p>@ rikizle: Very impressive! 2.5 to 3.5 and without D’s or F’s. That’s amazing. I was on Academic Probation at my CCC for a year, but fortunately, was able to replace the old grades through AR and retaking them. With your grade trend, you’ll get into all the UC’s. << pending you have finished your prereqs (or will finish them this year).</p>
<p>@ the OP: You have a chance at UCSC, Davis, UCSB, UCSD, etc as long as you get a 3.0+ and have the prereqs done. Just TAG and you’ll be fine.</p>
<p>Wow that’s a huge difference. Nice job rikizle.</p>
<p>Unfortunately, it might have to be my 8th year at old CC (or 3rd year at new CC) for my GPA to raise 3.0+, assuming I took classes and passed them with flying colors at the same phenomenal rate that you’re working at. 8 years at CC… surely UCSC or UCI will definitely take a look at that - if someone stays at CC that long will it make the uni’s think twice about accepting the applicant?</p>
<p>Thanks guys for the suggestion about TAG, I’ll definitely take a look into that once I get my GPA high enough to a 3.00.</p>
<p>Your GE classes don’t even matter much if you get good grades on your math/science/comsci stuff. Then again, that’s much harder too XD Good luck man 
It’s doable</p>
<p>Thanks. I think I definitely need lots of it lol.</p>
<p>How likely is it that someone who has gone to CC for 8 years + will be accepted into a UC? What’s the maximum limit of time you can stay at a CC before the reviewers at UC will think it’s excessive and use it against you?</p>
<p>I don’t believe it will ever be held against you. They will only limit the amount of units you can count towards your graduation. And I think 8+ years experience makes for a strong personal statement, if anything.</p>
<p>I don’t believe they hold it against you since many people are part time students.</p>
<p>A 2.7 with over sixty units is going to be hard to pull up, but you likely have two years worth of CS courses to pull it up. If you can get it up to 2.9 by next fall, you will have a decent chance (2/3) at getting into UCSC for Fall 2012, but this will require around a 3.5 GPA over the next three full time semesters. If you can’t get in that year, you will still be able to improve your GPA and if it is above 3.1*, you will be able to apply/tag into both schools.</p>
<p>*They’ve been increasing the TAG GPA at the UCs for a while now so always shoot higher but it is not like not qualifying for this is the end.</p>
<p>I say go for it.
Upward grade trend will help you.</p>
<p>Why not take chem or a foreign language class worth 5 units? If you can do one of those and get an A it’ll bump your GPA up.</p>
<p>“Why not take chem or a foreign language class worth 5 units? If you can do one of those and get an A it’ll bump your GPA up.”</p>
<p>IMO 3 liberal arts classes would be about the same workload as transferable general chemistry. Ex. sociology, english, philosophy. 4 extra units for the about the same amount of work. Depending on the profs, it may be a 1-5 ratio (easy profs for the liberal arts or hard prof for chem, or both).</p>
<p>I agree with WrenchFries.</p>
<p>A great way to raise your GPA is just take massive amounts of easy classes. Social sciences, philosophy, english and history are great choices, but I think the best two would be music and art. Always use ratemyprofessors if possible, and go for online classes when available. Rateyourprofessors will allow you to determine the work load of most classes, as well as the difficulty of getting an A. </p>
<p>The great thing about TAG is they just want your overall GPA to be at a certain point (except for a couple of majors that may require certain GPAs for select classes) so you can just stack pointless units to boost it up. They won’t look at your classes and notice you took a ton of easy classes as GPA boosters. However if you apply without TAG, they will definitely notice.</p>
<p>Thanks guys for the great advice about taking classes to boost up GPA. Unfortunately, I have no choice but to take the courses for my major otherwise I might just have to stay at CCC for even longer (like 10 years or more!).</p>
<p>I have a W and an F on my old transcript that hasn’t been cleared yet. The class I got an F on I repeated twice and can’t repeat it again unless I petition for a repeat; however, at my new CCC I can still take a class that is the equivalent of this failed class - will doing this overwrite the F from my old transcript? </p>
<p>Also, will a W and an F that hasn’t been overwritten (“class retaken”) on my old transcript still affect the chances that I’d successfully be admitted into the TAG program even though you have a (assuming) 3.0 GPA or above a year later or so when combining the old and new transcripts?</p>
<p>If I meet just the minimum requirements for TAG later on, will I still be accepted into TAG or can I still get rejected because there are others who have higher GPA’s and better looking transcripts than me? Let’s say your major is selective. Will being admitted into TAG still guarantee admission into the major (once you finish all the prereq classes and kept the GPA requirement for that major of course) or can you still be rejected (assuming you kept up your grades that fall)? If not, will ECs or the personal statement be the “make or break” decisive factor?</p>
<p>Does race (affirmative action) matter like it does in high school or not when it comes to CCC transfers (and TAG for that matter)?</p>
<p>Sorry if I sound like a total noob if they’ve been answered before or can be found on some FAQ.</p>
<p>Oh wow, where do I begin…I’ll go backwards for the hell of it.</p>
<p>1) No, affirmative action does not matter. If you’re a first generation college student, that’s about as helpful into AA as you’ll get for the UC’s.</p>
<p>2) TAG guarantees you admission to the campus but not necessarily admission to the major. For example, if you TAG for Psych (generally selective), but they only admit you to the campus, then you’re considered for your back-up major. You put a primary and secondary major on your TAG forms. Correct me if this has changed. </p>
<p>3) A W will not really affect your chances. Period. If you have an old transcript with an F still in it, that will be part of your GPA. If you retook it or got Academic Renewal, then that grade is either replaced by the new grade or done away with because of the Renewal.</p>
<p>4) Taking the equivalent class does not get rid of the old F. It must be the same class. Example: I failed a business class my first semester at my CCC. It wasn’t offered after that, and I was never able to retake it because only different biz classes (fulfilling the same requirement) were offered…so basically I was SOL…except Academic Renewal saved me lol.</p>
<p>I wish you the best of luck! A lot of us have started off pretty rough in community college. I dropped out of 2 high schools b4 community college, and even soon after that I wasn’t doing well at my CCC. Keep on working hard and you’ll get to where you want to be. You seem to have the determination; your posts reflect that. Best of luck to you!</p>
<p>Most UCs will admit for major for TAG applicants actually. UCSC appears to be the only one that admits to campus only.</p>
<p><a href=“Understanding UC transfer | UC Admissions”>Understanding UC transfer | UC Admissions;
<p>@studentswanthelp - “Unfortunately, I have no choice but to take the courses for my major otherwise I might just have to stay at CCC for even longer”</p>
<p>How many units are you taking per quarter, and how many major requirements do you have? If your major isn’t unit heavy, you should easily be able to add on some easy online Art/Music classes to raise your GPA.</p>
<p>Thanks again guys for taking the time to read through my rambling and answering my questions. Much appreciated. :)</p>
<p>I’m taking 3 classes/15 units right now, out of a maximum of 20. I plan on taking the maximum 20 all quarter-semesters after this one. I have 9 classes to take for my major requirements, a total of 46 units (one class is 6 units). I am currently tackling 2 of these classes. The other class is for the AA degree at my CCC. I have 7 more classes/33 units (excluding the one class I’m currently taking right now, which if added would be 8 classes/38 units) to take for the AA, although there are 4 other classes under the AA degree that would also fulfill my major requirements as well. The reason I’m trying to get the AA degree is because I hope it would improve my chances of getting the UCSC major (Game Design) since the Baskin School of Engineering webpage specifically suggests it and a game design college guide website says it will “transfer well”. And since I have quite alot of classes to take for both the AA and the major for UCSC, I figure I’ll use these classes to help raise my GPA although admittedly I’d have to do really really in all of them.</p>
<p>In all honesty, I’m just taking a risk since I really don’t know exactly how well the AA degree would improve my chances of transferring into the major at UCSC, especially considering my crappy grades at my old CCC. If anyone or anyone knows anyone who has any experience getting accepted into this major from a CCC, pray do tell me getting the AA will, like the college guide website stated “transfer well” into the major at UCSC.</p>
<p>One thing that worries me is that the major is “selective”. Another thing is that they say “it must be clear that you are capable of completing the major in a ‘reasonable period of time’”. The second requirement really gets me because as you all know, I have that old transcript from my CCC with crappy grades over a period of 5 years. By the time I will have gotten the AA and completed the major requirements at this new CCC it will have been 7-8 years at both CCC’s. However, the only classes I completed at my old CCC that count toward the major requirements were 3 Cal classes (I-III) a total of 12 semester units although I got C’s on all three classes. I also took the English requirements at my old CCC but the UCSC major doesn’t recommend IGETC and English is also not a major requirement.</p>
<p>This all means that I will have completed the majority of classes for the major as well as the AA at my new CCC in hopefully 1-2 years (so I could apply for the third year). I also aim to pull this off with excellent grades. Does this in any way help redeem myself/help convince the Admissions Committee that I am “capable of completing the major in a ‘reasonable period of time’” since I will have completed the majority of the major requirements at the new CCC in 1-2 years? Will it also help if I did it with excellent grades? Or will again the old transcript at my old CCC screw me up again?</p>
<p>I realize I’ve sort of shielded myself from the harsh reality in my OP by telling you guys “I know some of you may be thinking ‘wow you suck. maybe school is not for you. go find a dead-end job in manual labor or other unskilled profession’. Please don’t give me that stuff because it’s neither constructive nor helpful.” I take back these statements. Perhaps I just really *effed myself over during the past 5 years at my old CCC. I don’t know. What do you guys think? You guys especially emil and rikizle have been really supportive and encouraging but I’ll accept anything now, even if it sounds harsh and all. What I really don’t want though is to get my AA and work my ass off for 1-2 years only to find out later that UCSC won’t accept me. Then I will have to stay at CCC for another 1-2-3 years to take classes for another major just to go to CSU. It might have been better if I hadn’t done anything for the past 5 years sigh…</p>