<p>I'm a senior in high school heading to a community college this fall. I plan on transferring to a UC and majoring in biology and hopefully attaining a B.S. I'm wondering how important the role of getting IGETC certification is for a biology major. There are a lot of lower-division classes I need to take before I transfer for my major (bio, chem, organic chem, etc.) I would ultimately have about 85 credits if I took the lower division classes AND took the required IGETC courses. I know about 70 units transfer if I'm correct. So what I'm really asking is, should I try to obtain IGETC or just go for core admission requirements? Thanks for reading all of that lol sorry if it was confusing.</p>
<p>You should do both, even if it takes you another year to complete them.</p>
<p>Completing IGETC is crucial for your application, especially at UCLA and Cal, if those are the schools you are aiming for. I’ve heard that if you don’t have your IGETC completed for these two schools, they put your application to the side and treat you as a “denied” applicant, my friend works at Undergraduate Admissions here at UCLA. </p>
<p>So unless you’re an engineering major, IGETC is definitely needed. </p>
<p>Good luck to you in the upcoming year.</p>
<p>It is very important for any major when transferring to a UC school… together with [Welcome</a> to ASSIST<a href=“your%20pre-reqs”>/url</a></p>
<p>Make an appointment with your counselor at the cc and get an educational plan asap so that you don’t waste time nor money on classes you won’t need.
Use assist.org as well to see which classes from IGETC are part of your major, that way you kill to two birds with one stone.</p>
<p>Here is what IGETC looks like: <a href=“http://www.sdmiramar.edu/stu_svcs/transfer_center/IGETC.pdf[/url]”>www.sdmiramar.edu/stu_svcs/transfer_center/IGETC.pdf](<a href=“http://www.assist.org%5DWelcome”>http://www.assist.org)</a></p>
<p>go to assist.org</p>
<p>Listen to me: What this website says is the truth. It is your class-planning Bible. It is right, and your counselors are wrong if they EVER say ANYTHING which contradicts it (which they probably will). If it says you need IGETC, you NEED IGETC!!! If it says a class transfers, it transfers. If it doesn’t say a class transfers, it doesn’t transfer. It is right. It is right. </p>
<p>Repeat after me:</p>
<p>I will go to assist.org
I will do what it says</p>
<p>…Was I clear enough? ASSIST.ORG IS ALWAYS RIGHT!! NO MATTER WHO SAYS OTHERWISE!!!</p>
<p>LOOOOOL @Wacker1990. That’s so true though!
But please have an educational plan following assist.org & IGETC.</p>
<p>I totally agree with @Wacker1990. My counselors at my CCC almost set me back one year. EFF that. Do your own research and THEN follow up with them, turns out for students transferring, you might know more about the process than they do, at least at most CCCs.</p>
<p>My personal story:
I am an electrical engineering major. My major does not require IGETC. In fact, on assist.org, they specifically tell people of my major to not do IGETC. My counselor told me to do IGETC. I almost wasted a year of my life because of their misinformed advice. Counselors, in general, know less than the average student. In fact, the community colleges could save a lot of money by seriously paring down their counseling staff. Please, PLEASE: just follow assist.org. I have heard countless stories of others falling victim to the same trap into which I almost fell. Can you imagine? A year or more of your life --not to mention all of the money, work, and late nights that you spent-- being a complete waste, all because you weren’t willing to do 30 seconds of research on assist.org to expose those counselors for the frauds that they are?!?!</p>
<p>You can tell that I feel very passionately about this…</p>
<p>As someone who has been accepted to UC Davis as a science major (Chemistry),do IGETC. Most majors require you to do complete IGETC and it will help you as an applicant when you apply. I say this because because it could help you get TAG with some UC’s.UCSD,for example, definitely wants IGETC completed as part of their TAG contract.Therefore,it wouldn’t hurt to complete IGETC.</p>
<p>BTW, Wacker1990 is completely correct.</p>
<p>If you can get above a 3.75 and complete most prereqs, its your preference if you want to do igetc (depending on what schools you want to go to). If not, do igetc and as many prereqs as you can and so you can recieve tag. If I didnt do igetc, I wouldnt get tag, and I wouldnt have gotten into UCSD this year as I only have a 3.1. Keep in mind that UCSD’s tag gpa cuttof went up to 3.5 next year from 3.0. My best advice is to do igetc so you can tag. Make sure you plan well. Do all of the BS easy gpa fluffer classes during the summer and prereqs during the school year. Research what each school wants, regarding tag and prereqs. Bottom line is talk to the counselors from the school you want to go to. The ones at cc’s suck fat ones. And check out assist.</p>
<p>For a tough major like Bio, keep IGETC secondary. I just got into UCLA and I worked like crazy to get major courses done and still it wasn’t enough time to finish probably all of the bio courses. Luckily I wasn’t a bio major when I applied but I did consider it. Your focus should mainly be finishing ALL of your assist.org prereqs and then at the same time, work on the 4 course (humanities, social science, physical, bio) UC requirement and a bit of general courses here and there as space fillers in your schedule. You’ll waste your time if you try to finish IGETC. Even ASSIST says not to do it in most cases.</p>
<p>That four course requirement can be fulfilled by just taking 1 humanities or 1 social science course or something since your major courses should cover the physical and/or bio sci part. That’s what I did. Make sure you also finish the English classes. I’m not too savy on what the foreign lang requirements are since I did 3 years of Spanish in high school and did not need a foreign language to transfer. I think Berkeley only asks for that.</p>
<p>UCSD’s TAG DOES require an IGETC but you won’t be allowed to major in Biology if you take that route since it is so impacted. What they will mostly be looking for if you intend to major in Bio is that you completed all of your prereqs with good grades.</p>
<p>Thanks for all the good info everyone. That helped a lot. Is it ok that I will have about 85 credits by the time I transfer though? Will I get credit for them?</p>
<p>iono about all of these long posts.</p>
<p>heres what i did in steps:</p>
<p>1) Go to your community college counselor with IGETC sheet in hand.
2) They will give you a 2 (or maybe 3) year plan on what classes to take before you transfer
3) Research on the UC you want to get into and what specific courses you might want to take.
4) Go to Assist.org to see if what your counselor told you is accurate.
4.1*) IF NOT ACCURATE, THEN GO TO ANOTHER COUNSELOR AND DISCUSS IT!!! sometimes Assist.org may be out of date. So it is very important that both your counselor and assist.org match up together.
5) Make sure to take AT LEAST 60 UNITS before you transfer. You don’t need more than 60 units to transfer.
6) Study hard. Community college can be a pain in the butt. Just bust it through like a fookin animal and be done with it. </p>
<p>gluck:)</p>