<p>Hi guys,</p>
<p>I am strongly considering Community College Honors Programs for the first two years of my college education. I have high stats but it makes sense to me to save my family money.</p>
<p>Anyway, I was looking for highly reputed honors programs that will get me into top-tier schools. I am a California resident but I am open to schools out of my state as well.</p>
<p>If you guys have any suggestions, I would really appreciate it and add your suggestions to my research list.</p>
<p>Best Regards!</p>
<p>wow, after two days still no responses?</p>
<p>This forum tends to be a little quiet. You may get more responses on the generic “Transfer” forum.</p>
<p>California has a lot of great CCs and if you can get a 3.8+, you can potentially transfer to some of the big UCs, most the CSUs, and most the privates in the state. The CC Honor Programs are a nice option, but A) the courses are not that much more difficult than the regular courses B) the main advantage is they often guarantee smaller class sizes and the CC may offer the Honor Program students an earlier registration priority. </p>
<p>Where do you want to transfer? What do you consider a “top-tier” school? Stanford has a 2% transfer rate, so treat that like a lotto ticket because 98% of qualified, smart, 3.9+ gpa transfer students are turned away. Ivy-league schools are also major long shots. However, the other 95% of private LACs are all possible. </p>
<p>There is almost zero advantage to attending a CC outside of California if you simply want to transfer to a college already in California.</p>
<p>What if I want to transfer out of California (privates like Duke, Northwestern etc.) are there more “prestigious” honors programs out there?</p>
<p>That I don’t know about, I mostly am aware of California programs. But in general, I haven’t really heard of other CC programs that are so prestigious that they would give a leg up on transferring to elite colleges.</p>
<p>The real secret recipe for transfer students, so to speak, is to get a 4.0 plus one or two extremely impressive ECs. And what is really “impressive” is not a fixed target. Pick ECs that stretch you as a person and that you feel passionate about. Then package that experience into the transfer essay. Safe and easy are not good buzz words or concepts–so a cool sounding internship may not really grab the attention of the adcoms if the student is just another cog in a wheel at the company. </p>
<p>For example, I know someone who worked a part-time job for a group home, looking after young adults with mental handicaps such as severe austism. His essay went on to describe how he handled a real-life emergency situation when he got a phone call in the middle of the night to help find one of the young adults who had wandered out of the group home and was missing. This job had no direct relationship to his intended major–but I personally believe that his essay (which I read) probably had a lot to do with his getting into Berkeley. He had other great ECs, but the whole package of who he was as a person, his passions and activities, was key. It was more than good grades or honor courses. Most “smart” people can swing good grades. But who are <em>you</em>?</p>
<p>That’s why I really think that trying to find some that somewhat mythical honors CC in another state is not the best use of your time or resources. Elite colleges are always long shots–and what you can do to make yourself attractive and garner an admissions can all be accomplished right wherever you are already in California.</p>