I Appreciate any responses I get to this in advance. I am a CCC student who is looking to apply for transfer to UCs after one year of college. I will have 60 units by the end of my first year completed (19 in Fall '19, 21 in Spring '20, 22.8 in AP Credit, and 9 in Summer '19). I will be a pre-med major, having received As in all my courses thus far and expect to receive As in my fall semester as well. By the fall semester, I will have the gen chem series complete and in the Spring, I will be taking the second semester of gen bio, first semester of calc based physics, and first semester of o chem. My question is, how much of a factor will not completing physics and o chem play in my admissions decision to UCLA and Cal? I will mention that I will complete o chem second semester in this coming summer in the additional comments, but I would like some input from you all if possible. Thank you!
You need to speak with the transfer advisor at your CC because they will have more familiarity with the specific requirements for various majors at the 2 CUs you’re considering.
However, it will likely have an impact depending on what major you’re trying to transfer into. Missing some key expected transfer coursework and you may not get accepted into your preferred major.
P.S. Pre-med is not a major at either UCLA or UCB. A pre-med can major in any subject so long as they complete the coursework required for medical school admission.
Thanks for your comment. I have only really wanted to go to those 2 schools, and with most of my pre req science courses done at CC, I figure it wouldn’t be as bad.
Thanks for your comment. I have spoken to my transfer advisor, but All she said was that I meet the minimum requirements to apply so it is worth a shot. Also, for Cal I am applying u def I refractive Biology and for UCLA it will be psychobiology. I didn’t want to lengthen the post so I kept it generic in my discussion as pre med
My suggestion is to complete as many med schools prerequisites as possible in UC’s, it is proof of your capability to handle tougher courses to the medical school adcomms.
I shall warn you that the weed out class such as O chem and Bio chem are very tough at UCs because the class tended to be larger than CCC and professors do not hand out as many As. However, your academic excellency will be redeemed by earning high scores at UCB or UCLA. The worst scenario is to take half O chem in CCC and the other half in UC, because jump into the second half of a class in a newer, tougher environment is going to make the learning process more difficult.
One more advice, never take O’chem with lab in the summer. O’chem is a different learning process from Gchem and a short summer semester is not a good learning environment.
^^ I agree that you should take as many of your pre-reqs as possible at whichever UC you do transfer to, especially if your transferring after your freshman year. There are medical schools that will not accept CC credits for fulfilling admissions requirements, and those that do accept CC credit expect competitive applicants to have taken additional coursework in the same department, preferably a number of UL credit at the 4 year equal to the number of CC credits.
Taking Ochem during the summer is bad idea because the material is often compressed and/or truncated in summer sessions due to time constraints and may leave you with gaps in your knowledge base. (Also the compressed summer schedule makes it difficult to recover if you have have any difficulty with any of the concepts or have one less than wonderful quiz grade.)
Thanks for your reply, but it does not really answer my question. I wanted to know if not taking them before transfer will impact my admission to UCLA or Cal in any way.
I am not too worried about O Chem in the summer. I have been teaching myself through an MCAT book so I think I will do okay. Thanks for letting me know about the med schools, however, as I will know how to look into that in more detail.
The UCs are dealing with many premed transfers that have not completed prerequisites, its the norm. The missing classes will NOT make your application inferior. Don’t worry about it.
When checking if you meet the 60 unit minimum, be sure not to count AP credit which is based on the same material as a course you took in college (e.g. AP biology and college general biology), since UCs do not allow for duplicate credit (also, check with UC if the summer immediately before entering a UC can count). In addition, repeating AP credit with a college course may mean marking “repeat” on your medical school application.
It looks like you want to complete a bachelor’s degree in three total years (one at a CC, two at a UC). This may not necessarily be a good thing for pre-med purposes.
In terms of missing prerequisites, look up ASSIST.org for your target major and campuses to see what course work is listed as absolutely required versus what they want to see as much as possible completed. For example, https://www.assist.org/transfer/report/13736710 says that the UCB IB major for 2016-17 (the latest year shown, unfortunately) requires transfers to complete the general biology, general chemistry, organic chemistry, and math prerequisites, but only recommends the physics prerequisites. The UCB MCB major has similar wording at https://www.assist.org/transfer/report/13736723 .