Hey everyone! I’m in the process of filling out an application and I’m having some issues, so I was hoping I could get some insight.
I’m a nontraditional student (late 20s) who is currently finishing up an AA degree after being away from school for almost a decade. I would like to transfer to one of the local universities where I live and I’ve been slowly working on the application, but I am unsure how to answer the questions about high school because of my age.
First off, do I need to get a copy of my high school transcripts? What about where they ask for GPA/class rank? Both were good, but I can’t begin to remember what they were.
Second, the application asks for extracurricular activities, but don’t specify when. I could put high school stuff, but I don’t know what that will show other than I have a decent memory and a yearbook handy. I was fairly active in a club when I was in college before, but again, that was almost a decade ago.
I don’t want to leave it blank if it’s going to hurt me, but since high school/first stint in college, my “extracurricular activity” is remodeling my home and somehow I don’t think that’s going to be on their list.
Should I not be that concerned about it, because it’s going to be pretty obvious that I’m not in high school based on the fact I’m sending college transcripts and my DOB?
As far as I’ve been told colleges don’t really expect high school info from non trads. Unless there was something spectacular that happend in hs. You’re ECs now, GPA now are more important. ECS can include remodelling your house, taking “fun” classes(cake decorating), tutoring, raising a family,etc., even high school students can put things like babysitting as an EC.
If you want you can dig up your old stuff, but most
places won’t care for it as it’s been too long since HS to make
any assumptions about your character and abilities from it.
Contact the admissions office for the university to confirm what they do an don’t want.<br>
I have found that they are truly eager to help and answer any questions you might have, so rather than sit confused with the application in front of you or go off our best guesses, better to get it straight from the horse’s mouth, no?
One of the schools I was considering applying to for transfer requires a HS transcript with the application, regardless of how long it has been since I graduated, while the other only requires it once you are accepted as means of class placement/prerequisite check (which seems pointless since I have 60+ hours off CC credit to attest to/qualify for that, but whatever). I also had to submit an extended resume and my admissions advisor indicated that was where I could go into detail about both my HS and CC ECs, because the application was designed to cater to freshman applicants and didn’t really work for transfers. The more time that passes since you left HS, the less important all of those scores and activities matter, but for some reason some schools want to have it, and as Laurenney said, if there was something interesting or remarkable that happened back then, it probably won’t hurt you to bring it up, it’s just not usually necesssary.
I wanted to add that part of my concern is that my gpa is pretty bad. The long and the short of it was that I was a great student in high school. Strong grades, decent ACT scores, solid ECs. My first year of college was respectable, but an unexpected death in the family caused my grades to tank the spring semester of my sophomore year and I left school midway through what would have been my junior year.
Fast forward 7 years and I decided to enroll in a local CC. My grades could be stronger, but I should be close to a 3.0 in the classes at the CC. So, if you look at everything overall, it’s clear that something unusual happened that caused the grade drop.
However, there doesn’t seem to be a place on the application to explain all of this. This school doesn’t do essays and there’s not a place to add a personal statement. Once I get a response to my first email, I’ll be following up with more questions.
That’s odd that they don’t have an essay or special circumstances option. Maybe you could submit one as a supplement for the committee, similar to how many schools don’t require letters of rec but you can include them if you want? Just a thought… A 7 year gap is pretty large, so maybe they won’t give too much weight to your previous coursework and will focus more on what you’ve been able to accomplish recently.
