Transfer Back?

Colleges and Universities A-Z Cornell University
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Hi everyone,

I am a sophomore into CAS studying CS. I just transferred here fall semester from a small engineering college in MA. Unfortunately this semester has been abysmal for me and I am thinking of transferring back. Cornell ran out of housing so I’m stuck in a special program house with a bunch of freshmen–not other transfer students. I came here looking for nerdiness and geekiness and staying up late at night talking about subjects as diverse as quantum mechanics to international politics. Instead s looking more for an MIT-vive but

Instead I have no friends, my classes suck, the advising here has been terrible.

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Oops hit send before finished

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Essentially my time at Cornell has been abysmal. I spend most of my time despressed and crying, which is the opposite of what I usually am. Typically I’m a go-getter who works intensely and always has a plan and this semester I’ve completely fallen apart and I’m simply anonymous in this school.

My question: should I go back to my old school? I had friends, I could run track (I can’t here), I was doing research and published it, I had faculty connections. At Cornell I’ve completely had to rebuild and it has gone poorly. I’m looking for the nerds, but can’t find them and advising is impersonal and so are the professors.

Also: I was accepted to transfer into Columbia SEAS. Would this be a better option for me? I always loved the city and knew Columbia has more of an intellectual vibe, but it has a lesser CS dept to Cornell. However, the dept is much smaller so it would be easier to get individual attention and do research and recommendations. Being at such a huge school like Cornell in the middle of woods has depressed me and while NYC is huge, being there has always made me happier. I know Columbia also is very impersonal and transferring again would be difficult, but I had loved the core curriculum and at Cornell no courses really satisfy that same niche. I was planning on going to grad school so Cornell would look better but not if I’m unhappy for another 2.5 years.

Maybe if there is some STEM housing or a frat I could join that would help out, but right now I’m with ppl who are just an amalgam of different things and I have nothing to say to them or vice versa.

TL;DR

Any thoughts or advice? Go back to my old engineering school, stick it out at Cornell, or go to Columbia and get some more people like me?

Thanks!

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There’s a similar thread a little below this one. Maybe you guys should go kick back some brewskies (or whatever you guys do these days) and commiserate…

A university environment is very different from your small engineering college.

At a university, it is not always the case that undergraduates are the center of focus for every professor. Certainly not freshman and sophomores. When I was there, years ago, the quality of advising was very much the luck of the draw. I had one adviser who cared, and another guy who frankly didn’t. Maybe you can ask to change advisers. But, in general, in this environment you should expect less "hand-holding’ from them that you might be used to.

You might find that the courses get better in the upperclass years. For me, the large lecture classes gave way to more classroom-sized courses. You might try to find some upperclassmen in your major and find out if the classes you’d be taking going forward would also" suck". Since this year is what it is, it’s a sunk cost, you have to deal with probabilities for what things would be like going forward.

Socially, Cornell is a very heterogeneous place. I daresay there was nobody at your engineering college who was there to study hotel administration, apparel design, etc.

The people who want to discuss quantum mechanics and international politics are there. And in large numbers. But there are lots of other types of people there too. A large part of their freshman year was spent sorting themselves out, and finding their group of kindred spirits from among the masses.

But you weren’t there for that.

As for what you might do about it while you are there, all I’ve got is basically the same thing I told the other guy. Which you might adapt to the particulars of your situation.

If you decide to stay, shouldn’t you be looking for housing now for next year? Maybe you can put an ad someplace to the effect of “nerdy transfer CS student seeks like minded individuals to share an apartment next year”, and see if you get some people that way.

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FWIW your post #2 was not there when I wrote post #3…

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regarding housing, this is from a 2011 CC post, whether it’s correct now I’ve no idea:
“Acacia, Rockledge, Sammy (to a lesser extent), AEPi, KDR, Zeta Psi, etc. are all nerdy frats. They have higher house GPAs and higher proportions of science/engineering majors than other frats”
Also, when I was there, there was a place called Seal and serpent that was like that.

You may have missed rush though, maybe contact somebody at these places.

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regarding Columbia:
At Cornell you will likely be well on your way towards completing your distribution requirements as you head towards your upperclassman years.

At Columbia you would have to take The Core, which may constitute a lot of classes and they may not give you credit for what you’ve already taken to waive out of any of it. If so, that could cut into the number of advanced classes you could otherwise take for your major, or other areas of interest. You should look into this carefully.

SEAS is smaller, but socially Columbia is not necessarily so intimate either.
http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/columbia-university/1041703-4-years-later-reflections-of-a-columbia-college-senior-p1.html

And you would be starting over yet again.

My own daughter went to school across the street from there for her first three semesters, and she found that the lure of the city sucked the life out of the college experience. Among other complaints.
She found she desperately wanted a campus-centered school, and wound up transferring to Cornell. She preferred Cornell. Actually she loved it there. But she is not you.

On the other hand, there was a CC poster who transferred from SEAS to Cornell, and said he regretted it, he preferred Columbia. But he attended many years ago, and it turned out part of his problem was he was taking 20 credits a semester at Cornell while working several part time jobs. Plus of course he was not taking the same courses at both schools. And ultimately Cornell did not do so bad by him, he went on to get a PhD in EE (IIRC) from Berkeley.

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Just occurred to me, Columbia SEAS has articulation agreements with a lot of liberal arts colleges that don’t have engineering programs., which provides it with a healthy cohort of transfer students. If they are smart enough to house these people together, that may provide a decent social starting point for you. I don’t know if they do that though.

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FWIW, I just remembered another old thread where a Cornell student had been getting antsy there and was accepted for transfer to Columbia SEAS. After inverstigation she decided to stay at Cornell.

Here is her post: about her decision

“Speaking as an accepted transfer to SEAS from Cornell Engineering, I was actually told by one of the SEAS advisors, who also happens to be a professor there, that SEAS is more geared towards grad school. I know this may sound repetitive, but Cornell does seem more engineering oriented than SEAS according to what I’ve learned from students and professors at both SEAS and Cornell.
I was in kinda a similar situation as you’re in right now, deciding b/w SEAS and Cornell. And I actually ended up staying w/ Cornell. My decision fell on my old school b/c I realized how much I’ve enjoyed doing pure engineering and taking on challenges at the last minute (aside from some transfer credit issues I was having w/ SEAS).
So that’s my two cents. Just a reminder, no matter whichever one you decide on in the end, make sure you know what you want to get out of the school.”

Her field was Chemical Engineering,.

This was on a thread where someone who wanted to do premed was accepted to both Cornell and SEAS. He chose Columbia.

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Thanks for the comments. I am actually looking to go to grad school, in which case Columbia may be better. That being said, Cornell has many more courses and fewer requirements in general for me to complete my degree, so I would have greater ability to take advanced coursework (that being said, being with so many other students in the major makes it harder to stand out). Also Columbia engineers have a reputation for going into finance, whereas Cornellians tend to stay true to their cause.

At this point I would have to spend an entire semester completing the core requirements for SEAS, which frankly would be a waste of my time. So the logical solution would be to stay at Cornell. I’ll just have to make the best of it here.

Thanks monydad!

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It’s not clear to me that “Columbia may be better” than Cornell if one is looking to go on to a doctorate in the field…
Notwithstanding how she interpreted the SEAS professor’s comments. What is IMO more likely the case is that SEAS is better at grad preparation than SEAS is in preparation for practice. Not necessarily better than Cornell.

Just because Cornell is effective at education for engineering practice does not mean it is ineffective for the purpose of attaining a PhD.

The available data suggests quite the opposite… Actually Cornell is consistently a top -five undergraduate origin of science & engineering PhD awardees…
Columbia produces fewer. On both an absolute and percentage basis.

See table 2 here:
https://www.nsf.gov/statistics/infbrief/nsf13323/

also see these old CC threads:
http://talk.qa.collegeconfidential.com/college-search-selection/561639-top-producers-of-phds-in-engineering-p1.html
(note: Cornell % is distorted here- too low- since department had expanded in size, which was not taken into account).
http://talk.qa.collegeconfidential.com/college-search-selection/559039-top-producers-of-phds-in-physical-sciences-comp-sci-math-p1.html

When I attended, the majority of engineering grads wanted to practice, but there were definitely people who headed for grad school- and good ones. These people got what they needed to accomplish that goal. But I don’t know how they went about getting there, so I can’t really help you with that… They probably needed to be proactive. And show obvious talent.

You might want to go to the department head, detail your objectives and try to get an advisor who will better help you to get there.

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BTW same applies to CAS math-science oriented majors. Moreso., because fewer of those people want to go straight to industry. CS might well be completely different though.
My daughter graduated from CAS, IIRC if you do well enough you are invited to take a departmental honors route, which involves a thesis. That’s probably what you want to shoot for. Assuming my recollection is correct.

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Leave cornell while you still can. I hate this school and most of the people i meet also hate it

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@superdub - I guess you are having a rough time right now. You may want to start a new thread to share some of your concerns, and maybe we could help. Cornell is not a happy land for everyone, especially around prelims and finals time, but most students are generally happy. I hope it works out for you.

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@superdub According to your posting history Cornell was your dream school. What happened?

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Cornell is not perfect, there are features of it that some people can legitimately not like.

For me, it was very simple.
When I was doing poorly a) socially; or b) academically I did not like it there.
When I was doing well a) socially and b) academically; I did like it there.

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@superdub hey I am seriously considering transferring to cornell hotel next fall, could you let me know some of the reasons you do not like cornell and specifically sha? thanks!

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It’s not something you guys can help me with. There’s just a lot of things wrong with this school and I am definitely not the only student who feels this way. Most people I meet agree with me when I share my thoughts on Cornell.

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Yeah, it was my dream school, but now I regret coming. Oh well, I am not miserable or depressed, I just wish I went to another school

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Just to offer my perspective, having transferred to Cornell. I wouldn’t say everyone hates Cornell as Superdub suggests. Even though this is my first semester, I really like Cornell and I know a whole bunch of other people do. Every school has it flaws and I think it’s the people you tend to surround with or your interpretation ??? The complaints I do hear though is how people r want to go to a more prestigious university like Harvard or Princeton. That or the location. I think these are the two that people tend to complain at times but I honestly don’t hear that many people complaining as often.