<p>Re: 113 – true. If money is the problem, and you pay a higher price at a four-year school, it will make matters worse, faster.</p>
<p>This whole dialogue is making it clear to me that when people around the US say “community college” they can mean very different things. My local CC (which is what I’m thinking of when I say “CC”) sends two thirds of its entrants on to four-year schools as transfers. I have heard the complaint that there is too much pressure to transfer, and too much assumption that everybody intends to transfer, when some people are there for other reasons.</p>
<p>I’m sure if you go to our CC and take a certificate program to become a personal trainer in 9 credits, or an AAT degree in landscaping with most of the courses very practical, the professors might approach it differently. But the first two years of liberal arts BA/BS courses are somewhat different.</p>
<p>I looked at the catalog just now, and found that math at our CC goes up through Analytic Geometry and Calculus 1 and 2, then Linear Algebra, Calc 3, and Differential Equations. That should be enough to keep most recent HS grads busy for at least two semesters and save some money in the process.</p>
<p>How rigorous is the actual instruction in those courses, despite what the catalog might suggest? I don’t know. That’s harder to discern. That’s where talking with CC alums in your field, who have since gone on to good four year schools (or the department heads at the applicable flagships) might be most valuable.</p>