Questions about transferring after completing 2.5 years of college

Transfer Students
1

Hi everyone! This might be a bit of a long post, so please bear with me a little. Currently, I am a junior attending a small (2500 or so) student, highly ranked liberal arts college in the Northeastern US enrolled in a very niche and small major. As such our department and class is (or was) extremely close-knit. Long story short, one individual in my department and I became involved in a highly toxic relationship, in which I was manipulated greatly and resultantly significantly damaged my relationships with others in the class. I ended up returning home early this semester to study remotely as a result of the damage caused by this one individual, and I am currently working to rebuild my relationships with others in the department and am pulling away from the manipulative person. Still, the environment within the department feels extremely toxic, and to me there is no escaping this because of its small size and closeness. Furthermore, my class is set to study abroad next fall and this is causing me significant stress as I will be forced to be abroad with the person (and persons) in a very small, school-run abroad program.

Needless to say, this situation has significantly impacted my mental health to such an extent that I am strongly considering transferring to a larger, but also academically rigorous school preferably in the Midwest or Northeast. I am mostly here to ask about the logistical considerations of transferring at the end of my junior year, and what this would mean concerning graduate school and competitiveness, and also to weigh the benefits and drawbacks of transferring.

My ACT score, taken in the fall of 2017, is a 33. I have maintained a straight 4.0 GPA at my current college (although this might decrease to a 3.95 or so after this semester) and landed a competitive research-based internship this past summer in my desired discipline. I hope to attend graduate school in said discipline and have fostered close relationships with the professors in my department regarding research and graduate study.

In my transfer considerations, I would likely take a leave of absence for mental health this spring (my current school is lenient about these), and also to prepare essays/work on transfer applications. Based on the amount of credits I have at my current college, I would likely need to complete both junior and senior year at whichever university I would transfer in to. Primarily, I am wondering if re-taking junior year at the new university (and graduating in the spring of 2023) would harm my chances of being admitted to graduate programs in my discipline (Russian/Slavic Studies).

I also know that it is rare for students to transfer during their junior year, so I am wondering if this is something that present any kind of challenge for me. I also have not discussed the financial implications of this yet with my family, but fortunately I do not think that would pose much of an issue. In addition, I am wondering if universities will allow for students to transfer if they have completed more than two years of credit, as I’ve read conflicting information regarding this.

At the moment, I am considering the following universities for transfer, as they have good programs in Russian Studies, and many also have the option to minor in Serbo-Croatian which I have desired to study for many years but is not available at my current college:

  • UMich Ann Arbor
  • Northwestern University
  • Columbia University
  • Brown University
  • Cornell University

Thanks for taking the time to read through this! Hopefully this makes some sense.

2

Understanding that you will almost certainly need to complete two full years wherever you transfer to, and that you will need to be aware of the financial aspects of this, I do not see any problem with taking much of this year off and transferring to start next year.

It would be best if you can find something productive to do while you are off.

There will unfortunately be toxic and manipulative people everywhere. We all need to learn to deal with them, and it can be difficult to do this. However, I agree that any one person is likely to be easier to avoid at a larger program. I am not sure that there is anywhere with a large program in Russian/Slavic Studies, but there will be at least programs that do not have the same toxic person that you have already had to deal with.

Life is not a race. We do not need to take the fastest path from wherever we start off to our graves. Taking part of a year off in the middle is fine IMHO.

3

University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, and Indiana University have reputable Slavic departments and both have specialists in Bosnian-Serbian-Croatian, if you want to consider more options in the Midwest.