Looking for a Transfer School That Offers Financial Aid to Transfer Students

College Search & Selection
1

Hello Friends,

During my senior year of high school, I hastily enrolled in a 4 year university near home that I am not satisfied with after my first semester. In my search for universities to transfer to, I find that many do not guarantee housing or financial aid to transfer students. I am still searching, but also wondering if anyone would be willing to inform me of some schools that provide aid to transfers. My major is computer science.

I’ll leave my info from a what are my chances thread below in case that goes into your consideration of recommending a school. Thank you!

Major: Computer Science

College First Semester GPA: 4.0 (Enrollment Cum. GPA)
College Overall GPA: 3.62 (I took several classes at a local college during high school before enrolling in my current university. My first semester outside of high school I earned a 4.0)

High School GPA: 3.75 (Unweighted)
High School Class Rank: 71 / 414

ACT: 25 Composite, 24 English, 26 Mathematics, 22 Reading, Science 28
I am retaking the ACT very soon and will hopefully do significantly better due to not being an idiot junior in high school anymore haha

Extra Curricular’s

Student Government - Residence Hall Senator (13)
Residence Hall Association - President (13)
Math Club (13)
Intramural Hockey (13)
Intervarsity Christian Fellowship (13)

Robotics Team - Team Captain (12,13) (Qualified for World-level tournament Senior Year of HS)
Euphonium Performance (9,10,11,12,13)
Jazz Band (10,11,12)
Pep Band (9,10,11,12,13)
National Honor Society - President (12)

Work experience:
McDonald’s - Crew Trainer (10,11)
Albertsons (Grocery Chain) - Produce Clerk/Trainer (11,12)
IT Workstudy (13)

Other:
Member of a TRiO program in my state.
First Generation College Student

Financial Situation: Recipient of somewhat large Pell Grant

Race: White
Gender: Male

Thank you very much for your time!

2

State of residency?

Some states’ public universities provide decent financial aid to in-state students (including transfers). Others, not so much.

3

My state of residency is Montana, so unfortunately my options there are rather limited

4

Possibly Columbia and Cornell? But these are very difficult to get admitted to.

5

Those are definitely on my radar and I’ve been working on the process for Cornell for a couple months now :smiley: . My issue has been finding schools that are less of a reach and closer to a match. The problem has been finding schools that are at least reasonable in transfer financial aid and are a bit easier to get into.

6

Think about it. If the school has good transfer FA then lots of students will try to get in. Thus they become competitive for admission.

7

Look into St Olaf in Minnesota. Your ACT is low for them but your GPA is a big plus. They have a TRiO program.
http://wp.stolaf.edu

8

Unfortunately you have discovered the dirty little secret in college admissions - the best aid goes to the ones who enter as a freshman. You only get one chance and you need to make the best decision you can at that time. You are not alone here. Many people before you enter a school that does not turn out as expected. The only thing you can do is pick those schools where you think would work out better and apply. All this talk is for not until the actual admission letter comes with the aid package.

Good luck.

9

Are you aiming to send applications right now? Or next year?

There’s some universities that offer different tiers of relatively generous merit aid to their transfer students. Schools like University of Washington-Bothell, Hofstra U, Suffolk U, etc. That being said, for the highest amount of aid you’ll normally want to be above 3.75.

However,
I would not write off your in-state universities like MSU-Bozeman and U of Montana. Doesn’t hurt to have the options.

10

@“Snowball City”
St. Olaf looks pretty damn cool actually. Thanks for the recommendation on that! That’s the sort of thing I was hoping to find in my search here, schools that are like 30% acceptance rate. The Ivies are definitely cool and I’m hopeful for my application to a couple of them, but I can’t really feel safe much since they’re reaches for everyone. Thanks!

11

@philbegas
I’m looking to send applications right now. I’ll look into those schools and put some more consideration into my in-state schools. Thanks for you help!

12

Research all the Colleges That Change Lives colleges. I think they would be reasonable targets for you. You will need to read each site and perhaps email them to find out if they meet full financial need for transfer students.
http://ctcl.org/category/college-profiles/

13

@“Snowball City”
That’s a really helpful resource that I didn’t know about. I really appreciate your input!