So hey guys I just have a couple of questions. So basically my goal was to go to a 4 year right from the start and never wanted to go to a community college, but due to some family things I decided I would stay home and just go to community college here. Well basically now I’ve had a change of heart and really want to leave and go to a 4 year and have my families support financially. So my question is that I start community college next week and I was wondering if I should take the fall semester off and apply to 4 year colleges again as a freshman since i have not taken any college classes after my high school graduation. Another question is if I can apply as a freshman, and since letters won’t be handed out till the spring time, could I take spring classes at my local community college while I wait to get extra credits or would that make me a transfer student and I have to take the whole year off? My high school gpa was a 3.2 and sat scores of 1500, I know it’s not the best but I know that I can get into some Csu and I would appreciate any feedback on this because I can’t find the answer to these 2 questions anywhere.
Taking spring classes will make you a transfer at most four year schools. You would need to check (I know you need 30 hours to be a transfer at Penn State).
Thanks for the response, I appreciate it. So basically I will have to take the whole year off of school to do this, because honestly if that is so I think I’d rather just go to a cc, even though I don’t want to. I am planning on emailing the schools later on today to ask, the schools that I plan on applying to are: SDSU, CSULB, SJSU, SFSU
@BestBeats, any CC course at all after high school graduation and you are automatically a transfer at most of U.S. colleges. Going to CC first isn’t a bad idea. So is taking a gap year to work on your application and basic skills, or taking online courses without credit (e.g. Coursera, The Great Courses)
Okay just because I was just recently looking this up…
Less than 18 credits, you can apply as a freshman (First-year applicant is a “student who has attempted 17 or fewer semester hours of college coursework at a regionally accredited college/university before attending Penn State” http://admissions.psu.edu/info/future/firstyear/)
If you have more than one semester of college work and less than four, you can transfer to a branch campus instead of UP.
Could you clarify that more for me? So some can still apply as a freshman if they have less than 18 credits taken, which is like 9 per semester. But what do you mean by hours? Like they’ve attended the college classes for a total of 17 hours or less?
“Hours” usually means “credits.”
From SDSU’s website - “Who is a Transfer Student? If you have taken any college-level classes since the summer beyond your high school graduation, you are a transfer student. SDSU accepts transfer applications only from upper-division transfer or readmission applicants who will have completed 60 or more transferable semester (or 90 or more quarter) units by the end of spring 2016. We do not accept transfer applications from lower-division students with fewer than 60 transferable semester units.” http://arweb.sdsu.edu/es/admissions/transfers/index.html Are you local to SDSU?
No I am not a local for SDSU, as I live in the Bay Area, but it is a school that I would love to go to. I’m going to try to contact their admission office and ask them because I don’t see why I shouldn’t be able to just take spring classes at a community college while I wait for their response of if I got in or not. If I did cool then I can just go there and not care about those credits because they will be less than 12 so I’m not a full time student and if I get denied then I can continue to get my 60 credits and transfer.
Much success to you! Just make sure you have some safeties in your list of schools. SDSU is super competitive, especially if you aren’t a local.
UCs and CSUs define a transfer student as follows:
http://admission.universityofcalifornia.edu/transfer/
http://calstate.edu/transfer/
I.e. taking any college courses after the summer immediately after high school graduation makes you a transfer applicant for UC and CSU purposes. You would then typically need to apply in the academic year in which you will complete 60 or more semester units (90 or more quarter units) by the time you will transfer.
Well it looks like that I’ll be going to a cc then, because I rather not take a year off of school that I could be getting my 60 credits to transfer.
If you intend to start at a California CC and transfer to a UC or CSU, use http://www.assist.org to help plan your courses to cover major preparation and general education (usually IGETC) requirements for transfer.