Transfer Chance me and help with school choices.

Transfer Students
1

Reposted from ChanceMe
Current School: State Flagship, not top 100

Current Standing: First Year Freshmen

Schools that I somewhat plan on applying to: JHU, USC, Cornell and Brown but don’t expect those last two. I want some suggestions as well for schools if possible. Might throw in uPenn. Looking for a school with some sort of interdisciplinary plan or open curriculum. Was looking at WUSTL as well.

Anticipated Freshmen GPA: 4.0 First Semester, not sure second. Classes aren’t super hard, stuff like Calc II and Comp 130.

HS GPA: Can’t remember, 3.8-4.0

URM Status: If underrepresented state counts, Wyoming. Own a farm that I worked on a lot during high school.

ACT: 32 Comp

AP Scores: Took 11 APs, 4-5 on 7 of em and 3 on 4 of em. One was a self study.

Current Major: Computer Science, may switch to Biology.

College ECs: Pretty early in the year but I think I’ve gotten some stuff. Might try and learn R by myself.

LaTeX Workshop - Not sure why I did this, somewhat plan on writing articles in the future and thought it would be helpful.

Interning at two labs at once for some reason, doing entry work, plan on starting my own project with one of them. Both bird-related, which is why I chose them.

Audubon Society Board of Directors - Organize events and outreach

Cyber Security Club Member - CTFs and basic stuff like that

Piano - Taking Piano Lessons

High School EC’s have no direction, just sort of random stuff.

Have two recommendations lined up. Both will be pretty good. One is an English teacher and the other is a Zoology prof.

I want to combine CS and Zoology and use machine-learning later on to track movement or automated identification, University isn’t really helpful for either of those majors and looking for something with more of an open curriculum.

2

If you apply with only one semester of college to show, keep in mind schools will primarily be judging you based off of your HS stats. Not enough there to effectively evaluate you as a college student yet.

On top of this, make sure you solidify and make clear within your app your reasons for transfer (CS+Zoology is intriguing, but I’m not informed enough to know whether that will mean anything to the schools you are applying to).

I don’t know enough about your target schools to give you an informed chance, but if you look up their freshman admit stats, that will likely give you some baseline to judge yourself against, at least academically.

3

Academically you definitely stand a chance, but I recommend applying for junior transfer so you’d have a longer college track record.

Anything past academics can’t really be analyzed by outside sources so past academics it all comes down to you.

4

Is geographic diversity even a thing? I’ve read about it several places but haven’t seen a definite answer. You know any schools besides the ones listed that would be decent for a dual major sort of thing? I generally thought that junior transferring was harder as well. My HS ec’s are decent but they are not specialized and are just random, stuff like starting the math club, internship at a hospital, national/state award for Gov, nothing that supports my major application. @genedorbust

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Yeah I mean like I said I can’t really comment much. At first glance you’re right that they’re not really connected but that doesn’t lessen any possible meaning or impact you had from those experiences.

Geographic diversity is a very soft factor and usually more of a complement to an already strong application. I’d wager most schools have gotten their fill of geographic diversity from freshmen admissions. I feel you can make a more compelling application by trying to find what you’re good at outside of classes at your current uni and then apply for junior transfer.

A great tip: take as many upper-level CS/Math courses as you can – rigorous academics are very well-received anywhere. A 4.0 with freshmen/sophomore-year classes isn’t as impressive as a 3.7-3.8 with a good portion of difficult honors/upper-level courses for transfer admissions.

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If you want an interdisciplinary program you should take a look at NYU’s Gallatin school! With a great essay and your already amazing stats you have great shot. NYU is very transfer friendly as well.

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My classes are somewhat rigorous but mostly first year classes, I’m apart of honors and I’m taking almost all sophomore level classes as a freshmen but nothing super advanced, I’m not sure how I would get into high level courses at this point. I mostly plan on trying to get into bird stuff over the next week months and maybe some CS stuff. I’ll look into upper level classes.

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Take Linear Algebra, Multivariate Calculus, Data Structures all in your freshmen year. Admittedly its not easy to take upper-level CS courses even as a sophomore if you didn’t come in with credit, but if you took all those math classes as a freshmen you would easily be able to do Intro to Analysis, Real Analysis, Scientific Computation, Math Modeling, Partial Differential Equations etc. in your sophomore year and those are very rigorous upper-level classes that any school would appreciate.

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I’ll be taking Discrete Structures and Linear Algebra this year, might be able to fit in Computational Biology, a 5000 level class. I plan on talking to the prof. Thanks for the suggestions. I found a lab that actually deals with combining machine learning with hybridization and may stay at my current school depending on how that goes. Still somewhat looking at transferring but things are kinda shaping up. @genedorbust

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Where did you apply last time, and how did you decide to attend your current university?

What can your family afford to pay? Do they file the farm supplement with their federal taxes? Financial aid packages often aren’t very affordable for people with farms, and the Net Price Calculators at the college/university websites often can’t handle that kind of data.

Cornell is a good match for your goals because of the ornithology lab. Check out the possibility of a summer internship there. The professional contacts would be good for you even if you need to return to Wyoming for the school year.

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Thanks, happymomof1. We have a college fund that’s been around since before I was born and has a decent amount, so probably could pay like 25k-30k a year for 3 years. It’s not the main source of income at this point.

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If you can afford 25k-30k, you will still need significant aid at the places you are looking at. Sit down with your parents and run those Net Price Calculators. Pay attention to the amount of detail that they look for. If the calculators require all of your financial data, there is a better likelihood that the results will be accurate.

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That’s awesome @hotpetahgriffin. I strongly suggest keeping it up and pursuing those things throughout your freshmen year and early sophomore year and then re-evaluate whether you still want to transfer for junior year. Regardless of your decision you will come out a more mature and accomplished individual.

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Don’t know if it helps but I’ve also started to do some lab stuff over my Christmas break as well. Also taking piano lessons. Something else I’ve started was going on Ride-Alongs with police since I always thought that was interesting, would it be worth putting down?

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Geographic diversity is important at private, most selective colleges & universities.

A 4.0 GPA makes you a competitive candidate for your listed schools since you have at least the 25th% ACT (32). But transfer admissions requires a compelling reason or reasons in addition to stellar recs & superb academic qualifications.