Hey everyone,
I’m a second year student at Rowan University planning on transferring out due to dissatisfaction with academic rigor at my current school and my academic program. I’m a premed student and I plan on transferring into a biology program.
I’m currently planning on applying to Columbia, Cornell, Stanford, UCLA, UCB, Dartmouth, UPenn, Northwestern, and Vanderbilt.
My college GPA is a 4.0 through 3 semesters, taking a heavy load of science classes.
For ECs, I’ve worked in a biology research lab at Rutgers and co-published a paper, I’m a tutor at my schools tutoring center, I’m a medical assistant at a clinic, I hold leadership roles in 3 different university organizations, and I have volunteered in a health facility in Guatemala.
Please let me know what you think my chances are at the schools mentioned above or any other T20.
You look competitive as a transfer but what is your budget? Are you a California resident for UCLA/UCB? Financially you need a plan for 6 years (2 years Undergrad and 4 years Medical school).
The California UC’s give priority to CA community college transfers followed by UC to UC and CSU to UC transfers, CA private school transfers and finally OOS transfers.
Are you in-state for Rowan and will you need non-federal financial aid to attend your next school? If so, you should not apply to any of the UC schools.
As for chancing, more info is needed about your past academic record and demographics. I will note, however, that some of the schools on your list have transfer acceptance rates that are lower than their very low first-year admit rates, so even if you are a top candidate, your chances are low.
Look at Common Data Sets and research the admissions stats. There are top schools where transfer admissions rates are (relatively) higher than first-year rates (Vandy, WashU, Emory and, yes, Dartmouth come to mind).
Also, see if the schools you are targeting have a transfer coordinator who can help you understand what credits they’ll accept from Rowan and if they have any transfer credit agreement that covers NJ publics in general and/or Rowan in particular. If you are on a pre-med track, you are already facing many years of schooling and you don’t want to add extra semesters to make up undergrad credits. (A note about Columbia: it will be very difficult to complete the extensive core curriculum there starting as a junior, so consider that.)
Lastly, med school seats are hard to come by and getting one depends on high undergrad GPA and strong MCAT scores and faculty recommendations. You can achieve all those things at Rowan, but if you’re not happy there…
Hey thanks for the reply,
I am in state for Rowan, and I will be applying for federal aid at whichever schools I apply to for transfer. Unfortunately, I already submitted the UC application.
For my past academic records, I had a 3.7 UW 4.2 W GPA in HS, 1480 SAT. I am an Indian American male.
I know I can do well at Rowan, but at the same time I also just feel that the access to high quality resources is more limited to me here, and I would really like the opportunity to have access to those resources.
I am not a California resident, and I am planning on applying for aid for wherever I apply to. At the end of the day though for medical school, I have resigned myself to being in debt should I choose to go.
If you are set on transferring out of Rowan I recommend expanding your list. All of these are difficult admits. Not saying don’t give it your best shot but medical school students matriculate from dozens and dozens of schools and your list is heavy on prestige and burdened by very low transfer acceptance percentages.
That said, you have an excellent GPA and med focused ECs, so it will primarily come down to your essay on why and how each of these schools in particular can provide what your current school does not.
You may be looking at a lot of debt to attend med school, but try to limit your debt load where you can. (Your future self will thank me for this advice.)
Note that schools that are need-blind and meet need for first-year admits do not always extend those policies to transfer students — you need to look into the aid policies for each school. We’ve established that you cannot expect help from the UC schools, for example. So you will likely need a lot of private loans to attend, which your parents will have to sign or co-sign. Are they up for that?
Also, may I ask why you would not consider Rutgers, which I’m assuming is your in-state flagship? It appears you are already finding some opportunities to get engaged in your area of study there.
My primary reason for not considering Rutgers is because I think that even without going to rutgers I can already get a lot out of it just from living nearby. I don’t have to attend rutgers to participate in the well funded research labs rutgers is known for. Also, for the matter of maintaining a high GPA for medical school, I have already taken most of the difficult classes associated with my major and I anticipate being able to transfer the credits
I definitely understand minimizing debt, which is another reason I am choosing to look at t20s, since most are extremely generous with financial aid.
At this point I am mostly just curious about my ability to actually be accepted to one of those schools, and if not what I could do to round out my application.
You can round out your application by ROUNDING OUT your applications! Your reasoning on Rutgers is off- you can participate in research all you want, but you need a Bachelor’s degree to be competitive for med school, and that Bachelor’s will come from being enrolled in the University, not a part-time researcher position.
There are tons of colleges which would prepare you well for Med school where you wouldn’t be looking at miniscule transfer rates. Would be great to see a few of those on your list.
And what’s Plan B if you aren’t successful in your transfer applications?
As @Metawampe indicated, unless you are truly in love with the Columbia Core- and are strong across the board academically- Columbia as a Junior is a bad idea if you are truly set on pre-med.
yeahhh…so from here it looks more like a straight prestige-name play, as there are quite a few places between Rowan and Stanford with “high quality resources”, so I am wondering if you are suffering from the common (but erroneous) belief that a fancier name will help your chances in med school apps?
One challenge with transferring as a Junior is forging relationships with profs. It is do-able! but you are starting on the back foot, as many research posts for the coming year will be already filled by existing students. You will have to establish yourself as a star to get the kind of LoRs that you will need for med school.
I would drop Columbia, Cornell, Stanford and the UCs, keep UPenn, NU and Vandy, and add UNC-CH, UVa (both of which are state colleges but meet need), Pitt, maybe University of Richmond, maybe a couple of others.
O.K., you only want chancing advice, I get it, and you are focused on the T20. That’s a common desire, but it won’t necessarily serve you because if you are really unhappy at Rowan, only applying to high reaches will actually increase the likelihood that you will need to stick it out there.
I don’t understand your reasoning on Rutgers, which as you note, has the kinds of resources you like, so why wouldn’t it be the right place to complete your degree requirements? That’s a rhetorical question, however, because it’s not the kind of feedback you requested. Good luck to you, though.
This is sounding pretty good so far. It is not obvious to me that you want to change it. Add in quite a bit of medical experience, strong MCAT test results, and good references, and your chances for medical school acceptance might be better than average.
You are applying to high reaches that take very few transfer students. If you get into any of them, you are going to find that the level of competition in your classes has suddenly ramped up, and you will be competing against students who are used to the tougher rigor.
Either staying where you are or transferring to Rutgers seems to me to be something to very seriously consider. I would add an application to Rutgers while you think this over.
Also, as others have mentioned you should expect to be full pay at UCLA or UCB in the unlikely event that you get accepted. If you want to keep the option open of attending medical school in the future, you should try very hard to avoid debt for your bachelor’s degree. I would not transfer if it is going to add significant debt.
I have a daughter currently studying for a DVM. Years ago she was frustrated by the enthusiasm with which I insisted that she stick to budget. A few years later when she had her B.Sc. in hand she was very glad that I had not allowed her to take on any debt. This is making it easier for her (and us) right now.
Us older folks on CC will sometimes comment on what you want to do without actually answering your question. To answer your question, I would consider all of the schools that you listed as high reaches. To me your applications look more like “prestige hunting” rather than “changing universities to fill an academic need”. This is likely to make transferring more difficult, and it was already going to be very difficult for any of the schools on your list.
You have a 4.0 and you’re thriving where you’re at. You’re a prime candidate for medical school if you score high on the MCAT. Medical schools look at grades and MCAT scores. College pedigree is not part of the admission equation, because there’s no correlation between college brand name and success in medical school. Also, you might find that the school you go to isn’t so great after all. Choosing a school based on rankings or prestige doesn’t usually end well. It makes students blind to things that could turn it into a poor fit, because they can’t see past the prestige rainbow. If the school is too expensive, the stress causes grades to suffer. If the curriculum is a poor fit, grades could suffer. You’re trying to go to medical school. You don’t have a lot of room for something to go wrong…which there is a good possibility something will. Transfers are notoriously like that. It’s literally gambling your future, with no additional benefit.
Plus, seriously…if you want to do medicine, you need to keep the debt to a minimum for undergraduate. Medical school will rack up loans fast, and high undergrad loans will seriously inhibit your options.
My advice…stay put. You have a 4.0. You’re doing great.
For these colleges…you will need to give an academic reason for wanting to transfer there. What exactly will that be…since your current college offers biology as a major.