i didn’t get into the college of my choice because i had a low sat score, the rest of my application is pretty good.
Is it better for me to transfer to a college or take a gap year?
What organizations accept intl students for exchange programs/ jobs for the gap year?
How difficult is it to get into a top tier college as a transfer?
Do not take a gap year simply because you hope to improve your test scores and get into a school that rejected you on the first try. There is no guarantee that you will increase your score enough to make a significant difference, and “top tier” colleges will always be difficult to get into. They reject thousands of highly-qualified candidates, with perfect or near-perfect SAT scores every year. Take a gap year because you want to spend time doing something else apart from attending college. As for increasing scores, ask yourself this: do you think colleges will be impressed by someone who had an extra year to bring his scores up? They will be more impressed if you do something interesting during a gap year. Are your parents prepared to support any gay year projects, in addition to financing four years of college? There are plenty of websites dedicated to gap year opportunities all over the world.
Have you already been accepted to any colleges? Perhaps you should ask for deferred admission at one of them. You could take your gap year, and then find additional colleges to apply to while holding onto an actual acceptance. You do yourself a disservice if you remain wedded to the concept of “top tier,” and chasing a “brand” instead of having a life. Most students will not get into the “top tier,” but will move on and thrive wherever they go.
If you spend your gap year doing anything academic or exploring different cultures through travel or any volunteer activity through americorps, thats surely gonna add to your resume. Dont take a gap year just to increase your scores (you can still do that), do something which you’ve always wanted to do , but didnt find any time for it.
@woogzmama lol gay year. Made my day!
Take a gap year if that is what you want to do. I doubt it will make a huge difference unless it is something incredible and it has to be because you want to do it not to get in. If you got in someplace you are ok with and are only doing a gap year for admissions then I would go and plan on tranferring instead. I would make sure that the schools you really want have taken transfers from the school you attend
I just want to know what is better. I will obviously make the most of my gap year- travel, intern, etc, but is it a better option to apply as a transfer student or a gap year student?
which one of the two increases my chances?
also, if you could please direct me to a website(s) that have gap year programs for international students overseas.
thank you.
I got into Sarah Lawrence and Northeastern. I am waiting for Purdue.
i want to do a communications major and SLC doesn’t have my course. So i can only do the compulsory courses and then try to transfer. That is what is my biggest dilemma. I want to go to NYU or UCB or even try for an Ivy. I cannot seem to decide whether taking a gap year and volunteer or work really hard in my first year of college, maintain my GPA and transfer.
Taking a gap year will not guarantee admission to those universities, but it sure wont hurt. If, you have already applied to those universities and got rejected, then dont apply again. A gap year wont help much in that case, unless you win the ISEF or something of that calibre. For the ivies, its harder to transfer in, so if you’re dead set on ivies, then its better to take a gap year and do something useful.
If you need financial aid, take the Gap Year. Admissions is tougher for transfers, and aid is not as good.
You cannot transfer to UCB as a sophomore. They only accept junior transfers, and take the overwhelming majority of them from California community colleges. Do not go to college planning to transfer to Berkeley, or any other UC, unless you are a CA resident entering a community college.
International transfers don’t get financial aid, so if you need FA, keep that in mind - attending college somewhere means you’d have to stay there since you couldn’t transfer. In addition, at top schools, admission as a transfer is harder than as a freshman.
For UCB, you can only apply after 2 years (and, from a concrete point of view, although there are other paths, it’d mean 2 years in community college in California).
For Cornell, if you’re fine with the school of agriculture and life sciences (that’s also where Dyson is), you could attend a community college in New York State.
But based on what you said community college would really be a waste of your time, for a very elusive goal.
You got into Northeastern: if you can afford it, go there (unless you got into NU.in… then a gap year makes more sense).
Gap year: you have to organize it yourself. Volunteer with an organization in your country, or work, or backpack around Europe, or see if AFS can send you study in a high school in a country where you’ve never been and where you barely speak the language…