Transfer to Columbia as international student

Hello all.

So with college application season over, I got into Amherst College as a complete international with a full scholarship and I’m perfectly happy with it. I have a question I’d like to ask though.
I was hesitant to apply to Columbia because it’s need aware, and I could pay only like 6000$ max a year - and that’s stretching it. The more I look at it though the more I see it’s my dream school.

As a student with 3 international Olympiad medals (IChO, IPhO and IOAA, that’s chemistry, physics and astronomy); a founder of a country-wide non-profit organization with a mission to help unrepresented groups of students in attaining science competition training (main way for students from my country to have their names known internationally, yet lacking for most students outside the capital) whose website was linked on the official pages for chemistry and physics competitions for our country; designer and organizer of several lower level physics competition problems where I worked with professors; founder of a free private school for the sciences; and writer of several scientific papers, I would like to know what the reality is. I think my extracurriculars and awards are fine, but would a transfer application from me, being need aware with such a low amount I could pay, actually get me anywhere? Or is it a good idea to reapply to HYP and MIT as a transfer (while applying I only had 1 international Olympiad medal, still hadn’t founded the non-profit, still hadn’t designed competition problems, and hadn’t yet written as many scientific papers).

The number of transfers accepted by HYPM varies between 12 and 24 per year, so anyone’s chances are slim. In most cases, the accepted students were coming from colleges that did not provide them with the academic opportunities desired - something that does not describe Amherst, particularly since you have yet to set foot on campus.

Love the school that loves you back, especially when they give you a free ride, and reassess after a semester.

Not quite if you’re asking about transferring before you even start school.

Agree with @skieurope about embracing the amazing and generous opportunity you’ve been given. If Amherst doesn’t satisfy all your itches then give transferring a go.

Why is Columbia your dream school and why are you looking to transfer?

For Americans, Amherst is an Ivy-equivalent. By alumni achievements, it’s on par with HYPSM on a per capita basis.

BTW, the odds that you will both get in and be able to afford those unis you mentioned are pretty low.

Go to Amherst. Enjoy that AMAZING OPPORTUNITY - a world class school with a full scholarship. Literally thousands and thousands of students could only dream of it.
If by January 2023 you are still drealing of Columbia AND have made a huge impact on the Amherst community, think of transferring.
BTW, Americans who “know” would consider Amherst at least equal, if not superior to, Columbia.
I’m also not hearing anything about the core or yearning to take HUMACC1001, all very important to Columbia’s identity, but if you want to recreate that, with Amherst’s open curriculum you could try and reproduce it.