Should I transfer my sophomore or junior year?

Transfer Students
1

I’m a freshman, and I’m at the point where I just know my current institution isn’t the right fit for me – my only dilemma is whether I should apply as a sophomore transfer or junior transfer.

Even though I trended upward, my grades in high school were mediocre/poor. I basically did really bad all throughout my freshman-junior years, but I somewhat pulled it together my senior year and did well compared to my past. I ended high school with around a 3.6W and 3.3UW. I plan to talk about this in my additional information section, but my poor grades are attributable to my experiences growing up FGLI (first-gen low-income), and how in high school, I was purposeless - I just did not try academically and had no intentions of moving forward in my educational pursuits - mostly because it wasn’t something that was expected of me by both my family and my counselors.

I ended up scoring decently on my ACT (32), so I miraculously ended up getting into a T40 university and now attend. I’m performing substantially better than in high school (I ended up with a 3.85 this semester), but I’m worried about my high school stats bogging down my chances of transferring. I understand that I’ll have much better chances if I wait to transfer as a junior, but my school 1) simply doesn’t offer what I want, and 2) not transferring now would be impeding progress towards my pursuing my ultimate goals, because none of the majors at my school prepare me for what I want to do with my life (I also talk about this in my additional info section). I also don’t enjoy being at my school and worry that spending another year here may take a toll on my grades that I’ve worked hard to salvage.

I’ve spent a lot of time on my “narrative” and essays and they are probably as strong as they’re going to get, so I only want to apply once. Should I wait or should I just take the risk and apply this year? If I properly articulate why my high school grades were lower, highlight my progress in college, and give reasons why I need to transfer now rather than later, is it possible to successfully transfer as a sophomore even with low high school grades?

2

What is your intended major?

What is your budget?

What is your home state?

What university do you attend?

There are a lot of very good universities in the US. “Top 40” is quite good. I attended graduate school at a highly ranked university (top 1 for what I was majoring in) and I think that on average the other graduate students there were probably just barely NOT from top 40 schools. Certainly many were from schools ranked 1 to 40, but just as many were not.

Pulling off a 3.85 looks to me like four A’s and a B. This is quite good at a top 40 university.

Your most recent two years will matter the most in transferring. If you had a strong senior year of high school and a strong freshman year of university then I do not see any harm in trying to transfer. Certainly if you apply and are turned down, universities will not hold this against you if you try again a year later.

However, you need to be careful not to transfer and then find that you were better off where you were. Transferring twice also would be unfortunate. You want to be pretty sure that you are transferring to a school that you will like better.

3

What is your intended major?

Currently majoring in economics, would like to switch to public policy which my school currently does not offer.

What is your budget?

I’m low-income and have 0 EFC so probably not much. Planning on applying to mostly private schools that meet 100% demonstrated need.

What is your home state?

Ohio, I know Ohio State has a good public policy program but it suffers from the same problem my current university does (lack of diversity). It’s also too big for me, looking for a mid-sized or small institution ideally.

What university do you attend?

Tulane University

Pulling off a 3.85 looks to me like four A’s and a B. This is quite good at a top 40 university.

4 A’s and 2 A-'s. A- in Calculus 2 and Writing, A’s in Intro to Micro, Environmental Ethics, a public health class, and a one-credit freshman seminar.

Your most recent two years will matter the most in transferring. If you had a strong senior year of high school and a strong freshman year of university then I do not see any harm in trying to transfer.

That’s true. I wouldn’t say my senior year was strong necessarily, but just much better than I had ever previously done in high school. I got mostly a mix of A’s and B’s my first-semester senior year, the second semester it was all A’s and one B+. Junior year was a mess, I had mostly C’s and a D first semester, and the second semester trended upward with a mix of A’s and B’s, one C+. I took mostly STEM classes my junior year but I don’t plan on majoring in anything remotely related to STEM, not sure if this matters. Since junior year I’ve been trending upward.

However, you need to be careful not to transfer and then find that you were better off where you were. Transferring twice also would be unfortunate. You want to be pretty sure that you are transferring to a school that you will like better.

Yeah, this is a fair concern. My primary reasons for transferring are because my school doesn’t offer my major and because of a lack of diversity. My current school is extremely white (around 70-80%) and extremely affluent, and I’m the exact opposite of this demographic (low-income, first-generation, Asian Hispanic), so I don’t really feel represented. Currently on my list I have: USC, Georgetown, Emory, UNC Chapel Hill, Northwestern, Rice, Pomona, Claremont McKenna, Duke, and University of Redlands. I don’t really expect much, but my top choices are probably Pomona and USC.