Transferring back to original college (UMD-->AU)

Transfer Students
1

Hello all,

So I transferred to the University of Maryland, College Park this semester after attending American University for three semesters. While at AU, I was majoring in CLEG (Comm, Law, Econ, Gov), which is an Interdisciplinary Studies major that AU offers and was the main reason I applied to AU early decision in the first place (I’m extremely interested in all four of those fields). My second semester, though, I took an astronomy course and fell in love with it. I had always loved astronomy so this class was by far the best class I had taken at AU. I loved it so much I looked into transferring to UMD to major in physics and astronomy, which I did. Other reasons I transferred to UMD include: 1) Much cheaper (tuition is $10k/year vs $40k/year at AU), 2) Higher rankings in STEM fields, and 3) Still close enough to DC to go downtown whenever.

This semester, though, has been the worst semester of my college career. My grades are struggling (my GPA is going to go from a 3.77 at AU to sub 3.00 at UMD even though I’m only taking 2 courses related to my major), I tried to make friends by joining a few clubs but it hasn’t worked, I don’t like the town UMD is in at all qnd it’s certainly not as safe as the area AU is in, I miss the smaller campus setting and sense of community that AU has, and the people at UMD just aren’t as nice as the people at AU. I’ve hated it so much here this semester that I’m considering transferring back to AU to continue in my original major. I know I would be happy continuing in my original major; I didn’t transfer because I wasn’t happy, it’s just that UMD has the program I thought I would love. Also, I had to sacrifice a year abroad in New Zealand to come to UMD so thinking about that is just making me even more depressed. Lastly, I was never a strong math student in high school, and while I did fine in the astronomy and physics courses I took at AU, I just don’t think I’m cut out for a STEM major. I certainly did much better as a CLEG student.

In short, I thought UMD would be so much better for me than AU, having compared it side-by-side to AU on paper, but these past three months have been the worst months of my life and I just don’t know what to do anymore.

2

Condensed:

pros of UMD:

  1. much cheaper tuition ($10k vs $40k)
  2. higher rankings in STEM fields

pros of AU:

  1. smaller campus, better sense of community
  2. higher rankings in IR and PA
  3. is in a better area (Tenleytown vs College Park)
  4. closer to downtown DC
  5. fraternity/social life is better, people are nicer
3

If this plan is OK with your parents or whoever else it is who is paying for your education, then pick up the phone and call AU. Ask what you need to do in order to be readmitted. Usually the process is pretty short and easy.