Rate My Transfer Chances

Transfer Students
1

<p>Just the other day, I spoke to my seminar teacher about transferring. "Where to? Harvard? Yale? Princeton?" Oh, if only he knew how impossible his suggestions were.</p>

<p>I am a freshman attending the 27th ranked liberal arts college, according to USNews. I have just finished completing my first semester, and really want to leave the school for personal reasons. Long and dramatic reasons condensed, I despise the social scene and lack of support for majors outside of business; I only applied for the generous financial aid programs.</p>

<p>Well, here is the part you wanted to see. Raw data.</p>

<p>High School GPA: 3.0 to 3.3. Likely on the lower side. My high school had an early college program so I have an Associate Degree already.
College Courses Taken in High School: Calculus I + II, General Chemistry I + II, Physics with Calculus I + II, Intermediate Chinese I + II, Introduction to Computer Science, and a bunch of others.
SAT: 1990 (1340 Critical Reading + Math).</p>

<p>College GPA: 4.0
Courses Taken: Calculus I, Introduction to Anthropology, Jazz history, Entrepreneurship seminar. I have not yet been awarded college credit from high school.</p>

<p>Extracurriculars: Well, I can think of a few. Nothing very noteworthy.</p>

<p>Overall Evaluation: Due to lack of "stellar" extracurriculars, low high school GPA, and average SAT score, transfer into a top 20 university will be highly difficult.</p>

<p>Comment: Still, I have no intention of leaving unless I can make very significant progress. I really do want to leave, but the financial aid program is very generous here and I can survive another 3 years with full tuition.</p>

<p>Here are the schools I want to go to, categorized by my guessed chances.</p>

<p>Yeah, right. (0-10%):
Brown
Cornell
Washington University at St. Louis
University of Pennsylvania
University of Chicago
Claremont McKenna College</p>

<p>Might be possible. (10-20%)
Wesleyan University
Hamilton College (Proximity reasons)
Rice University
Emory University</p>

<p>I may be underestimating my chances, but I believe them accurate. I do seek other opinions, advice, commentary, refutations, etc. So, please do.</p>

2

<p>Your predictions are about right, although you might have a decent shot at Emory. You’ll have much better chances if you wait until junior year (and keep your GPA up), since your high school record won’t be factored in as much.</p>

3

<p>I think it’s more</p>

<p>0%
University of Chicago</p>

<p>1-10%
Brown
Cornell
Claremont McKenna College</p>

<p>11-15%
Washington University at St. Louis
University of Pennsylvania</p>

<p>16-20%
Wesleyan University
Hamilton College
Rice University</p>

<p>20-25%
Emory University</p>

<p>Since you’re doing quite well, I think you should stick it out for another year. Your college grades from high school won’t even be looked at like college classes at schools like these. </p>

<p>If you finish two years, your high school grades will be looked at less.</p>

<p>Just out of curiosity, why these schools?</p>

4

<p>Heywatchitbuddy: Indeed, my chances would be much better if I decided to stay another year; retaking the SATs would also be possible. However, I intend to either transfer this semester or remain at my school for the next 3 years, mainly because I have a very good financial aid package already. I dislike my current school for many reasons, and staying here for another year feels very contradictory to my original purpose in trying to escape. On the other hand, the situation is not bad enough to the point where I must evacuate, even through means of transferring to a lower ranked school. I can survive where I am now, but I would prefer to go elsewhere.</p>

<p>itransferred11: What I wrote above should answer some of your question. The schools I chose are ones I believe I have a positive chance (>0%) of getting into, and ones I also actually like. When I first applied as a rising freshman, my dream schools were Rice, Emory, and of course the lower Ivy Leagues Brown and Cornell. But since my high school GPA was very low, I had no chance and applied to more reasonable places.</p>

<p>I am also threatening to transfer in order to force the hand of my school’s financial aid office. Being the son to a single mother, I need as much aid as possible. The award I have now is generous, but I believe the school is still holding out on me.</p>

<p>I believe I would be happier at the schools I have chosen than the one I am at now. You may think I have evaluated on ranking alone. I will admit ranking is important; I have no intention of transferring to a lower ranked school even though I might be more satisfied there. Otherwise, I may as well play the staggering odds in hopes of moving to a dream school.</p>

5

<p>It’s almost impossible to get into these schools as a soph transfer if you couldn’t have gotten in as a freshmen. Yu need the second year if you want one of the top schools.</p>

<p>And I’d replace Brown on your list, they give aid to only a few transfers,</p>

6

<p>you have no chance at many of those schools</p>

7

<p>rice is very friendly to transfers, hamilton doesn’t take many. if you apply to Cornells IRL school you may get in, its basically the “back-door” into Cornell.</p>

8

<p>After further consideration of other opinions, I am probably going to hold off applying to Brown and Claremont McKenna. I really like those schools, but Brown’s need-aware policy and Claremont’s extremely low transfer rate makes my chances all but zero.</p>

<p>I still think I have a double digit chance at Wesleyan, Emory, Rice, and Hamilton. Cornell and Pennsylvania are extremely far reaches; I am applying on the low possibility my admissions officer sees a glimmer of potential in me… and I get waitlisted. Then, somehow get unwaitlisted.</p>

<p>Now, a question. Is being an undecided major detrimental to my transfer chances? I ask because many universities require me to make a choice between different schools of study. Picking between Rice’s engineering and business school almost feels I were declaring my major right then and there.</p>

9

<p>apply to the ILR at Cornell its the “back-door” into Cornell, they have like a 50 percent transfer rate.</p>