Hi, i am wondering if I am going to transfer to another UC and pursue a different major rather than my current major, do I still need to fulfill my current major requirement or just finish GE and the prerequisite of the major that I am going to change?
And for GE reqs, is it all Lower Division GE Reqs or ALL GE Reqs
@marychen I really recommend that you read through all the prior UC-to-UC threads in this website before asking questions as these are pretty basic questions that have been answered in the past.
You will want to fulfill the major prereqs for the UC that are you are seeking transfer to. So if you want to transfer to i.e. UC Berkeley which requires 6 lower division classes for the major that you want to transfer into, then you should try to take all 6 classes at your current UC. You will need to contact the major department at UC Berkeley to try find the equivalent classes at your current UC. Typically, if the classes sound similar and have the same prereqs, then you should be fine. But it is up to the school that you are transferring to (in this case UC Berkeley) to make the decision on which classes meet the major requirements at your current UC…
For GEs, you will want to fulfill ALL required classes (both lower and upper div) at your current UC to fulfill requirements for the UC Letter of Reciprocity. So if your current UC requires for GE 6 lower div classes and 1 upper div class in 5 subject areas plus English/Math/American Institutions, then you will need to finish all of these classes in order to get the UC Letter of Reciprocity.
Taking so many GEs by end of sophomore year is a pain and so what many people do is use their AP units or take an enormous number of GE classes at junior college during the summer between freshman and sophomore year. I know somebody who took 5 JC classes during the summer before sophomore year and transferred these units to their current UC to get their letter of reciprocity and then concentrated their sophomore year on taking the major prereqs for the UC that they wished to transfer to.
In short, if you are seeking to a major at a UC that has many prereq classes (i.e. Enineering/sciences), you will need to do a lot of advanced planning. However, for most social science/humanities, taking the major prereq classes in sophomore year is do-able provided that you have completed most of your GEs for letter of reciprocity over the summer.
I hope this helps. Again, many of these answers are available here in College Conf by just reading through the prior threads. There are tons of examples of folks who have successfully done the UC to UC transfer especially from the lower ranked UCs to UCB/UCLA. Lastly, I believe on youtube there is also a video about UC to UC transfer that was recently posted by “infinitelycindy” who did the UCSD to UCLA move for poli sci. Good luck.
thank you so much, this really helps me a lot!