I was hoping to hear a little about the transfer process at Virginia Tech. I applied to the College of Engineering as my first choice, but was denied to it and was given a spot in University Studies instead. I still intend on pursuing engineering and I Virginia Tech seems like the best option for me.
I loved the campus, the people, the food, the programs, the in state tuition - everything. But if it is going to be difficult to transfer to the College of Engineering and graduate in 4 years I will have to reconsider it, even though I really want to go.
I understand that University Studies students need a certain GPA and need to take certain courses to transfer but I am not concerned about that. I am just worried that I will not be able to graduate in 4 years with an engineering degree because University Studies students are not permitted to take every engineering course that is required to earn the degree.
So my question is - How difficult would it be to transfer over to engineering? And how will I take the engineering courses that are not offered in University Studies if I choose VT?
@Ae8474 Please read the attached links carefully as there are many new requirements for transfer to GE effective with the Fall 2015 class and it is the only source of up to date information. For example, now you need to have 12 credit hrs of “index” classes (there is a list of these) completed before applying for transfer. These classes must be taken at VT. Classes taken at a cc or AP credit do NOT count towards these 12. This is a very big difference from past years as many could complete the “core” Engr classes through AP credit or a cc and apply for transfer soon after arriving to VT. Also, there is now min 3.0 GPA requirement in the index classes for transfers which either did not exist previously or has been increased. Based on the new requirements, it will be more difficult to graduate in 8 semesters.
I’m learning it can be done in 8 semesters. it looks like they will offer ENGE1215 spring of 2016 if you have a 3.0 and then first come first serve. That is the difficult class to get. The rest of the courses you will be able to take. the links above explain all of this. can I ask what your stats are (in state? gpa, sat, rank, #APs?). Just trying to get a feel for how high the bar was.
@geoff1212 I’m an in state student from Northern Virginia
GPA: ~3.8 W, my school does not do unweighted GPAs (I know this is low for most engineering students)
SAT Math: 720 SAT Reading: 680
ACT Math: 32 ACT Reading: 32
My school also does not do class rank
Sophomore year APs: World History (3)
Junior year APs: AB Calculus (5), Psychology (4), English Language (4)
Senior year APs: Physics C, Statisctics, English Literature, Spanish Language
Total APs taken: 8
I also took many engineering related courses including an engineering math course, 2 engineering systems courses, and both AP physics and honors physics and got good grades in all of them.
Extracurriculars:
FIRST robotics team member
Varsity math league member
VP of a girls engineering club at my school
JV/Varsity volleyball
Key Club International Member
National Honors Society
Hispanic leadership club
I also have a paying job at a local tutoring place that offers courses and help in Math and Science. I have been working there since last June.
I am not upset that I did not get in because I understand that it is difficult to enter straight into the College of Engineering from Northern Virginia (however i think it was my GPA that held me back). I just wanted to see how difficult it would be to transfer since I know some of the rules changed from previous years and some of the old college confidential posts about this were outdated.
When you say first come first serve for the ENGE1215 course, how soon can you request to take it? And how many other students do you think are in the same boat as me and will try and take spots in that course for the spring semester too? Would it be safer just to take the course in the summer at a community college, or is it true that they do not accept credits from there anymore?
I apologize for all the questions but I am truly clueless. I tried calling the University Studies department yesterday and the lady was not very helpful. She told me that I should call back on April 1st to talk to an advisor instead…
@bboop42 I was unaware that they do not accept community college credits anymore… it seems like the transfer process has gotten much more difficult that I had originally expected.
I was also accepted to Penn State University Park for engineering, however I was hoping to go to VT instead because of the huge price difference in tuition since it is an out of state school. But I really do love both campuses.
Do you think this would be a better option for me? I would really like to graduate with the rest of my class in 2019, so if it is going to take longer than 8 semesters I am going to have to reconsider VT unfortunately.
@Ae8474. You are likely right it was your GPA because everything else is very solid. That’s strange that you could not get a class rank which might shed light on the GPA. During a campus tour at MIT they explained they don’t look at GPA since it is calculated so differently at every school. They use class rank instead. Penn State Engineering is solid. My BSME is from there and it prepared me well. University Park is amazing and congrats for that acceptance. Hopefully you scored some financial aid to make it comparable. My son didn’t apply there but was accepted at a few other comparable eng schools and the financial aid incentives made it comparable to in-state VT (especially when you factor in 9 or 10 semesters of tuition and NPV of a later career start).
I had read at the VT website that ENGE1215 would be offered to non-GE students with 3.0 on first come basis. I hadn’t heard that cc equivalents would no longer be accepted by VT.
I recommend you call admissions and not US. good luck.
Here is the link for the VA Community colleges where Enge 1215 transfer courses are offered and CURRENTLY accepted by Tech. I believe this will be the last summer for this transfer equivalency table to be in effect and then after that Tech will be re-evaluating which, if any community college engineering courses will transfer to meet their freshman coursework.
Not many of these community colleges offer these courses during the summer so you have to check each individual website to see what they are offering for their upcoming semesters. My son did the first Enge course thru Southwestern CC online during the summer before he first entered Tech (it is the only online Enge course accepted by Tech). We enrolled him in the CC well in advance and were on the web site the minute the summer course sign-up became available to grab a slot as they are very limited and much in demand. Used to be that the entire course was online, but the year my son did it they revised it to where you had to go to the campus twice during the summer for the entire day to do labs/exams. We are from the Richmond area so it was a LONG drive requiring an overnight stay at a local Super 8 and a bit of a pain in the butt, but you do what you gotta do if you want something enough. There were plenty of students there that were in similar situations, one student was there from GA!
We freaked out during Tech course request time during orientation when he was told that US students couldn’t request the Chem class needed to stay on track, but found out later (only thru our own work and persistence) that a waitlist would be made available to students who wanted to take Chem but were blocked from initial request. Easily got into the class from the waitlist. So, son remained on freshman Enge track and had the community college transfer course so that after his fall semester he was able to transfer from US to GE and then no problems taking the GE spring courses. Keep in mind this was during the time when you could have a 2.0 and still transfer. I think he had a 2.8 after his fall semester, so it was worked for him. With the new 3.0 requirement it obviously would not have worked and a very stressful spring semester would have had to been undertaken to get the GPA at a 3.0 and get the spring Enge course from a waitlist situation to hopefully get into GE after the spring semester.
He is currently a sophomore ESM engineering student who is ‘on track’. He has taken differential equations course online thru a VCCS last summer and will take Operational Methods online thru Tech over the summer in order to avoid the 18 credit hour semesters which would be absolutely brutal and would send the average student ‘over the edge’, the geniuses can do it, normal kids, NO! He is also going to take a relatively easy elective online thru tech this summer also, to hopefully boost his GPA (currently 2.95).
If you are transferring into engineering you will need to be placed in calculus or have taken calculus classes as well as chemistry and physics. If you took different core science and math classes then it will take more than 4 years because engineering labs require physics and calculus.
@gigagirl To clarify, yes, you can take classes at a cc and the credit does transfer, what the new policy adds is that those credits will NOT count toward the required 12 credit hours of “index classes” required to be complete prior to apply to transfer to GE.
Right! But I did read somewhere that the community college Enge classes will be re-evaluated by Tech VERY soon and who knows what they will decide about them for future.
What did you end up doing – going to VT or PSU? My daughter may be in the same situation and I would like to know how hard it is to get into VT Engineering from University Studies. Thanks for your help!