Hi, I’m currently a freshmen standing in credits with about 24 and would like to apply to transfer in Spring of 2021 for Umich’s LSA Computer Science program. I currently attend Middlesex Community College in NJ. My GPA is currently 3.3 and I have 4 w’s because I unfortunately had some family issues over the past year so I was forced to drop classes. I will try to get it up to 3.6 by Fall of 2020 and will definitely have strong essays, letters of recommendations from people I know and rigorous classes on my transcript. As far as highschool goes here are my stats:
2.7gpa (unweighted)
980 SAT on current scale.
I know that’s absolutely pathetic but the past few years of my life have been very rough outside of school and that will probably be the topic on my essays and how I’ve evolved as a student. I was just wondering if there’s any advice and if you can chance me assuming I complete my goals by fall of next year. I’ll also have around 52 - 56 credits around then depending on the classes I take. Thank you!
https://www.ugadmiss.umich.edu/TCE/Public/CT_TCESearch.aspx indicates that University of Michigan accepts very little from Middlesex County College for subject credit that can be applied to the CS major. Even if you are admitted as a transfer student, they will probably make you retake almost everything in the frosh/soph requirements. So even if you transfer with 52-56 credits that would theoretically need 5 more semesters to graduate, you will probably need more than that due to needing to retake a lot of courses.
You may want to see if your in-state public universities give more subject credit so that you can graduate on time after transfer.
@ucbalumnus thanks for the link! I also didn’t mention on the post but I might take some classes at another in state community college (Mercer) and it seems there’s quite a few classes that will transfer over. Lately I’ve been thinking about also majoring in math since I’m doing well so do you think it might be worth applying to LSA’s for math and seeing later if I can transfer to CS (If I only got into umich for math though I still would be very happy since it can be useful in fields of CS)?
That’s the problem with going out of state. Credits don’t transfer, and you’ll be looking at taking the same classes again at triple the tuition costs vs in-state.
As a programmer myself here’s my advice…DON’T. You’re not doing yourself any favors going to a school to pay triple the tuition of Rutgers. Tech is a ridiculously employable job market with an almost infinite amount of specialties, subspecialties, and micro-specialties. After about 3 years of experience, employers won’t care where you went to school because they’re desperate to find a qualified applicant for a job that’s been vacant for 5 months. I went to a regional state university. In my last job search, I interviewed with Google, Amazon, GA Tech, USAA and Target Corp just to name a few. I took a job with the state of Texas.
Affordability is very important, and I would highly discourage piles of debt. Expect to make a modest salary for the first several years after graduation. By the time you make enough to drive a BMW, your student loans will be paid off. I’d say most of us don’t take the “BMW” jobs anyway, because job satisfaction is worth more than money.
I agree with “cool guy.” It doesn’t make a lot of sense for you to transfer. And you will be farther ahead in the long run by staying instate- especially if you’re looking to transfer to a school like Rutgers that has national recognition- and by being able to get into the job market sooner.
Maybe it’s better to think about grad school at UMich.
Also, if you do decide to apply to transfer in as an undergrad, I’d start by working on testing and raising your test scores.
Best of luck in whichever way you move forward.
@coolguy40 So why don’t you work for google or amazon?