Finished one semester of college, want to switch schools and majors

I have just finished my first semester of college. I took the fall semester after high school off and started in the spring semester.

I finished with a very low GPA (About 2.1), but my highschool grades are very good (3.9 GPA).

I started in Engineering at University of Illinois Urbana Champaign (UIUC). I wasnt focused and i didnt enjoy the school or the engineering.

I have found that the business side of Engineering is what really interests and excites me, so I will be pursuing a Degree in business.

What options do I have now? Has this bad semester killed my chances of good schools or will they mostly look at my highschool grades.

Should I do another semester in UIUC doing grade replacement and bringing my low GPA up BEFORE starting over?

Any advice is very much appreciated thank you!

Hi!

It was your first semester. If you look, most schools will look past the first semester GPA with a good letter with reasons.

Have you take any business courses yet? These will be more important than the engineering courses, in your case.

There are two options:

  1. Do another semester where you are. This will show persistence, but depending on your financial situation, it may not be the best option.
  2. Attend community college and graduate with an Associates before going to a Bachelors program. I have found that this has benefitted people, and it has let them really sample coursework and make sure that it is what you want to do. You may even find that there is something more specific than business that you like. Also, the cost is a lot less.

I am graduating with my Associates in August, and I have found it to be very useful. I was originally a business and biology double major. Then, I realized that business was really boring for me. I was able to take all of biology classes and catch up fairly quickly without loans!

Hope this helped!

A 2.1 GPA will eliminate your chances of transferring to another university at this time. Stay at UIUC and try and do an internal transfer to their business school.

A 2.1 is vey bad. Were you focused on the party scene or are their other reasons for your poor performance?

Get your GPA up before even thinking about transferring. There’s nothing wrong with changing your major to Business within UIUC but get the grades up before you attempt to transfer schools.

neurobiomajor gave you solid advice. Transferring to CoB will be very difficult at UIUC.

https://business.illinois.edu/undergraduate-affairs/admissions/intercollege-transfers/

If you decide to stay at UIUC, you might want to consider industrial engineering or ACES.
Good luck!