Hey all I’m 23 years old and have been attending my local community college since I graduated high school at the age of 18. After my graduation I began helping my father with his company because we are an extremely low income family and I had no choice but to help as much as I could often working full time. Throughout this time I went to my community college with no idea what I wanted to do. After years of taking classes that covered my general education requirements the (IGETC) and catching up on my math and science courses because I was behind after graduating from high school I found my love for computer science. The past 5 years I’ve been working part-time/full-time hours helping my family, taken over 8 semesters of math courses, and have finally reached Calculus 3 with a 3.4 GPA. After this upcoming semester I will have completed Linear Algebra, 3 semesters of physics and every possible class thats transferable to UCSC as a Computer Science Major from my CC. My only concern is that getting to this point has taken me 5 years and by the time I apply to transfer next semester it will be almost 6 years at my CC! I was recently told by a friend that colleges will look down on this and I wasn’t sure if it was true? My goal was to complete all my possible transferable courses before transferring because I will be relying 100% on loans/fafsa to get me through a UC. Will this be impacting me negatively when trying to transfer? My primary school of choice is UC Santa Cruz which I believe has a 2.8 GPA requirement for transfer students. Is this something I should be worried about? If so is there anything I can do and does the same apply towards the CAL STATES? Thanks for your time!
Hi Waldo. just wanted to say I greatly admire you for helping out your father with the business and still ending up getting a 3.4 gpa with prereqs completed – and for Comp Sci! That is something I’m sure the UC’s will really appreciate and prize.
You don’t need to worry about admission to UCSC if you tag with them and if the tag is accepted. Without Tag, I’m sure you will have the chance to explain your situation and challenges you have had and how you overcame it all.
For Scholarships, your situation and story would be a great candidate and impressive (at least for me)! You will have to apply to a lot and explain your story and make it inspirational. Many of these scholarships have been made to help people with financial need backgrounds and so you may even end up getting a full ride or even more if you apply to a ton. Maybe if you took the next semesters light (but may need to be taken full-time if you apply for TAG), after you’ve applied, you can dedicate more time to applying for scholarships. There’s an almost unlimited amount of free money out there that is just waiting for people of most deserving and willingness to to go to University
The best thing for you to do however is to talk to a UCSC Admissions counselor as well as your own counselor. They’ll tell you if the 6 years is a problem which I don’t think it should be.
Best of luck!
Yes, see if TAG is something you can do.
http://admissions.ucsc.edu/apply/transfer-students/tag.html
UCs don’t care about length of time at CC. I’ve known transfers who have gone 7-10 years for various reasons, similar to yours, and have successfully transferred.
I spent 6 years at my community college, due to lots of personal challenges and hardships. This morning, I was accepted to UC Santa Cruz in their Anthropology department. I applied with a 3.49 GPA. Your dedication and persistence will make you stand out. I wish you the very best of luck and really appreciate you sharing your story!!
Congrats @rileyc21. Your determination and grit was clearly evident to the UCs. Bravo!
Waldo, congratulations on being able to help your family and being ready to transfer. Don’t worry about your age, it’s only a number and you are still very young. The UC’s understand people that have to work. You’ll be fine.
Those of us, who had to take this route, completely understand.
Waldoo, length of time @ a CCC shouldn’t make a difference, as long as you meet the criteria for admission. I’m really hoping to get into Irvine or Davis, and I’ve been at my CCC (with a few semester breaks) since my freshman year of high school which was back in 2001. I got a supplemental questionnaire from Irvine, so I think that means they’re at least considering me. Good luck to you & everyone else!
What a great story Waldoo- congratulations on your perserverance! Neither UC’s or Cal States will care as long as you have the right classes. Another advantage is that if you are age 24 before you attend, you will no longer have to list your parents on your FAFSA. As a result you will probably qualify for more FA and could end up having to pay very little. The only advice I would give is not to limit yourself to UCSC. I suspect you will be accepted but take a look at the UC threads, especially in CS, to see many students that were denied even though it appears they would be admitted. Be sure to apply to a few schools as safeties, especially as financial safeties. Include a few Cal States as they are less expensive. You might even include a couple of privates as some may end up being less expensive than publics after FA. It would be such an advantage to graduate with very little debt!
I spent 5 years at a community college. I took the classes that I should have taken in high school, and three semesters of calculus. My GPA was 3.9. I didn’t get into UC Davis. I was told that they don’t want students who have an excessive number of units. I graduated from a CSU. CSU will take almost everybody who applies.
I think you will be fine. I started over with school at age 30 after giving up on CC after 7 years of Ws and Cs and crap. I went back and did well, got into my school of choice. They care about your ability as a student, that’s all. If you demonstrate that you are a bad ass and deserve the opportunity to shine brighter, they will try to afford it to you.
@posterperson wow, was that the only reason why you didn’t get in? I’m trying to transfer to Davis tooo…your post really scares me. With a 3.9 they should have accepted you!
Hey there!
I also applied for UCSC (computer engineering). I admire your story and I know what its like to go through hardship. You’ll get into UC Santa Cruz no doubt about it and you shouldn’t have anything to worry about as long as you’ve met the requirements for transferring into the school.
I’ve been in CCC for 3 and a half years now. Its been a long road but it’ll be worth it once I start seeing acceptances in the coming months. I hope its the same for you to :).