I am a transfer student and I just got my UCSD admission rescinded because I didn’t finish my second UC English class which was Philosophy-130 (Critical Thinking). However, I took the class at another community college within the same school district that had the exact same course designation, title and syllabus. I only just found out that the class that I completed did not count for the English prerequisite. I completed all other transfer requirements, I have an overall 3.7 GPA and I have not failed any classes. I have an almost perfect TOEFL score and got an A for “A” Level English (international student). I have already submitted my appeal letter detailing my situation but I just want to know if anyone out there has any thoughts on my current predicament. I’m getting very mixed responses from the UCSD admissions office as to whether or not I can submit supplementary documents to help my situation. This is extremely terrible for me because I already transferred all my immigration documents from my previous community college and I don’t think I’ll be able to attend classes anywhere else this fall as they told me so late and most colleges fall semester start in a week or so. If anybody has any suggestions please do let me know. It would be absolutely terrible if I were not able to attend UCSD due to a technicality.
- Why did you take the course at another CC? Which CC?
- Did you check assist.org and with your transfer advisor to make sure that Philosphy 130 would fulfill the English requirement for the UC’s?
- What do you mean you did not finish the Philosphy course?
@Gumbymom hi thank you for your reply. So I attended Diablo Valley College and the igetc from them states that philosophy 130 is a valid prerequisite for English. I took the class at Contra Costa College which is a sister school of DVC and the class registering portal is the same. Their philosophy class is also called philosophy 130 (logic and critical thinking) so I took that class instead because it fit my schedule better that semester assuming it would be equivalent. I spoke to a counselor recently and she told me that it was regrettable and there were previous instances of this case happening due to the similarities in the classes but there was nothing much they could do but perhaps request for the dean of philosophy at DVC to approve course equivalency and hope that UCSD would accept it.
I meant that UCSD did not acknowledge that I had completed the English prerequisite. I understand that this is a rather complex situation and I hope you can understand my explanation.
@Gumbymom also I had a few of my peers take the exact same class and transfer to Revelle in UCSD (my original college) and other CSUs without any issue.
I was checking assist.org for Philosphy 130 at Contra Costa and I do not even see it on the UC-E transferable list. So sorry that there was this issue and I really cannot give you any advice other than unfortunately it is up to the student to ensure they are meeting the transfer requirements since Transfer advisors are far from infallible. Fingers crossed your appeal is accepted.
In an effort to help, I just checked our CA comm. college (Sacramento City College). They offer Philosophy 100 Logic & Critical Thinking which transfers to UC’s as an elective. They also have a Philosophy 205 Critical Thinking and Writing in Philosophy which transfers to UC’s as an English Composition class.
Look at the community college where you took the class to see if they have these two classes and which one you took. I hope it all works out in a good way for you.
@diegodavis: The issue is not that Philosophy 130 at Contra Costa college is not UC transferable, it is that the course does not fulfill the UC English requirement for Critical Thinking. The course has to be designated as UC-E Area 1B to fulfill this requirement. It is a CSU transferable course for area A3 Critical thinking. Not sure why is it acceptable for the CSU’s and not the UC’s.
@dwayneee I agree that those two classes should either be named differently or made to be the same. I just did a class search on 4cd.edu for Philosophy classes in your CC district. There are two classes with exactly the same course number and title. They show up next to each other in the resulting search. There is a difference in the description between Contra Costa and DVC. That is horrible if one of the classes matches what you need and the other does not. They need a big warning note on one if they keep them with the same course number and title.
Looks like DVC and CCC treat PHILO 130 differently even for IGETC purposes:
https://www.dvc.edu/enrollment/counseling/pdfs/18-19%20IGETC%20catalog%20final.docx.pdf
https://www.contracosta.edu/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/IGETC-2018-2019.pdf
Pretty bad idea for two CCs in the same CC district to use the same course number for different courses that do not fulfill the same requirements.
This is horrible confusion and I think you would have an excellent case for appealing
@ProfessorPlum168 @ucbalumnus @diegodavis @Gumbymom thank you all for your advice. Does anyone know if it’s possible to enter a UC with a missing English class and possibly take it there or take it concurrently at a separate community college?
You need to contact UCSD admissions and ask if this is possible to keep your acceptance. Unfortunately I think that the English requirement is pretty much set in stone, but it cannot hurt to ask at this point. You have nothing to lose and hopefully they are willing to be more understanding regarding the course mixup.
@Gumbymom update: UCSD readmitted me for fall this year! Thank you for your help and kind words 
@dwayneee: Congratulations and best of luck.