Date decision postmarked/received: SGR - April 21st, 2016 ~ Acceptance - July 7th, 2016
Which school/major at USC: Dornsife- African- American Studies
Stats: HS GPA: 3.8
College GPA: 3.67
Units: 31+
Applied to: USC
Accepted to: USC
Rejected from: None
Essays: I say I did a pretty good job. From the people who have read them rated my essays a 9/10. I wrote about an extremely sensitive topic that I’ve only shared with USC. I felt like it was necessary to show USC a different side of me as the side that was shown when I applied out of HS. So, I’m happy that USC accepted me, for being me
Recs: One from my English professor and another from my Honors College professor.
Additional info: I attended a out of state four year university in Hellzona, aka Arizona lol. I completely hated my experience there, but am happy to be living on my dreams as a Trojan at USC. As far as my Fall semester plans, I am not too sure, but I know for sure that I’m not going back to Hellzona, lol. I’m also a TTP applicant; my mother graduated with her Masters.
ACCEPTED- Marshall for Bus. Admin (Spring 2017)
Spring Grade Request - May 7th
]Decision Date & Time: (July 9th ~ 12:00 pm)
[ b]Stats:**
[] College transferring from: Public 4yr OOS
[] Entering as: Sophomore
[] GPA: 3.3 Fall & 3.4 Spring (had 1 W)
High school GPA- 3.5 (didn’t apply in high school)
[] Units completed: 36
[] Pre-reqs completed: Calc 1 and Fresh Writing
[] GEs completed: All except diversity maybe
[/list][ b]Subjective:**
ECs listed on app: PRSSA, On-campus ministry
Job/Work Experience: marketing internship, on-campus job
Essays ): All 9/10 (I put A LOT of work into them)
Letters of Recommendation: One from my writing prof, one from the dean of the program I was in because my regular counselor quit lol
[ b]Other:
Comments: I don’t even know what to say except that I feel so honored to have this opportunity. Despite my low GPA I was never really discouraged to apply or thought I would get rejected, I had A LOT of faith lol. I really put my all into getting accepted to USC (it was the only school I applied to) and that especially showed in my essays. I knew that I was lacking in the academics area and didn’t have a personal tragedy or anything to back it up, and so I made sure to compensate in other areas by focusing on how I wanted to utilize my education long-term and where USC fit into that. The reality is that your grades in school really don’t matter so much as what you learn and how you apply it. Show that and you may just have a shot getting into a school you should be underqualified for. If future transfers want help or anything message me! And congrats to everyone that got in!
Accepted
Term: Spring 2017
Major: Business Administration
School: Gordon S. Marshall School of Business
Spring Grade Request: April 28th.
Decision Date: July 9th.
Decision Received: July 11th.
College: Pasadena City College
Entering as: Sophomore
GPA: Cumulative: 3.9 Fall: 4.0 Spring: 3.8
High School GPA: Bad, but I don’t think they care because I had 34 units or more by the end of spring.
Units Completed: 34 units
Essay: 8/10
Applied to: USC
Accepted to: USC
Comments: I would say I’m really surprised. If you meet the minimum requirement to apply to USC, I highly suggest you do it. Nothing is impossible. Also, be patient about the decision. The waiting process is painful, but it is all worth at the end.
ACCEPTED
Term: Fall 2016
Major: Biology
REJECTED: May 31; APPEALED: June 6; DECISION: July 12
College: OOS 4yr Public University
Entering as: Sophomore
GPA: Fall 2.9, Spring: 3.8
HS Stats: 3.9, 29 ACT, IB Diploma
The appeal process is a wonderful thing, I didn’t think it would be successful, but it was! FOR FUTURE APPLICANTS: IF REJECTED, APPEAL, APPEAL, APPEAL (it’s free anyways lol)
Term: Spring 2017
Major: Business Administration
School: Marshall School of Business
Spring Grade Request: April 27th.
Decision Date: July 9th.
Decision Received: July 11th.
College: Santa Monica College (SMC)
Entering as: Sophomore
GPA: 3.85
High School GPA: Doesn’t matter since i took over 30 units.
Units Completed: 35 units
GEs: 6 including the 2 Global Perspective (important to note that every transfer must take 2 GEs while at USC)
Essay: Nobody here can accurately grade their own essays, so take their grading with a grain of salt.
Applied to: USC
Accepted to: USC
Words of advice for future transfer students:
From someone whose paid close attention to the admission process and has read everything you can about transferring to USC, here are some tips:
Follow your schools articulation agreement with USC carefully, I can't stress this enough. You'll want to know it by heart.
Complete as many GEs as possible and ALL the major requirements (this is where the articulation agreement comes in). There are people rejected every year with 4.0 GPA simply because they took no GEs and did not complete their major's requirements.
Make sure all your classes actually transfer.
Have a complete school workload. I took 4 classes both spring and fall semester and 2 during the winter.
For SMC and many other SoCal CCs, they have days where a USC counselor comes to your campus and does a workshop presentation and a Q&A. Attend all of them and ask questions!
Don't worry about extracurriculars, both my SMC counselor and USC counselor say admissions don't really look at those for transfers. I had none on my application. They focus mainly on GPA
Do your research, there are plenty of forum threads here you can read.
Comment:
I’m disappointed i was admitted to spring. This is because i have already completed the max amount of GEs and major requirements someone can do before going to USC. Taking any class this fall will only be good for units and nothing more. No CC class this fall will help me knock off any other required courses or GEs that are needed to graduate. I thought USC would understand this and admit me to Fall, but i’m wrong. So this fall semester will be not very productive for me when it comes to education…
Accepted - Marshall/Business Admin- SPRING Spring Grade Request - April 28, grades sent 5/12, but were not confirmed received until 5/31 Decision Date & Time: July 12
Stats:
[ul]
[] College transferring from: Loyola Marymount University
[] Entering as: Sophomore
[] GPA: 3.6-3.7 in high school, 3.86 first semester 3.91 second semester, 3.9 overall
[] Units completed: 32, 30 transferable
[] Units in progress: 3 over the summer, finishing art requirement
[] Pre-reqs completed: Business Calc, Writing 150
[] GEs completed: Not sure, a lot of mine satisfy half of a GE, since some require 2 courses. I know I have completed math, art, english, and a few others
[/ul]Subjective:
[ul]
[] ECs listed on app: Not much in terms of ECs
[] Job/Work Experience: Worked 2 jobs during the school year, but foolishly only put one on my app, doesn’t matter anymore I guess! I also am interning for my second summer in a row at a Fortune 100 tech company. But in all honesty, to anyone looking for the future, I really really don’t think USC cares about ECs. Basically every counselor told me that and they all say very strongly to focus on grades grades grades.
[] Essays (subject and responses): 9/10, spent my winter break working on them, just why I want to do business
[] Letters of Recommendation: Really good, one from my boss who is an active alum of USC, and another from my econ professor, and his class was really tough, only two/three kids got As, and he made them aware of that
[/ul]Other:
[list]
[] Other schools applied to: None!
[li] Comments: Never dreamed I would be going to such a good school. Also never dreamed I would find out literally 2 months after I submitted my spring grades. The past 2 months have been the biggest emotional roller coaster of my life, but I am so excited it is over and ready to fight on!![/li]
[*] Word of Advice: Do as many GEs as you can, and do ALL pre-req’s. If you’re trying to apply for sophomore year, don’t bother as much with classes that are “recommended” as they understand you haven’t been in college for long! Plus (this is for Marshall) classes like accounting only transfer for credit, not GEs! Knock out as many GEs as you can! I think for junior year they care more about recommended classes, but sophomore year just do GE GE GE GE GE!
Decision: Accepted Spring Grade Request-May 10 Decision Date-July 9
Marshall: Business Administration
Stats:
College GPA: 4.0
HS GPA: 3.2ish
Entering as: Sophomore
Units completed: 15 in the fall, 15 in the spring
Pre-reqs: Business calc, microeconomics, writing requirement
GEs completed: I don’t know the specific categories but I completed a lot.
Subjective:
Letter of Rec from my writing professor
My essays were okay. Nothing too special about them. I talked about specific things I would do at USC for business.
ECs: None
Other:
To anyone in high school who has low grades that don’t show your potential, don’t give up. Everyone(including myself) never thought I could get in.
@ohwiseone what did you talk about in your letter of appeal? i got rejected and was wondering what I could talk about since “compelling” info is very vague
Compelling means new information that is not part of your original application. Telling them to take another look at the same data/information won’t do it.
Term: Fall 2016
Major: Psychology (Dornsife)
Spring Grade Request: May 12th
Decision Date: July 9th
Decision Received: July 12th
Transferring From: SMC (Santa Monica College)
Entering as: Junior
GPA: 3.55
High School GPA: I’m pretty sure they didn’t consider my high school GPA since I applied with over 30 units. But my grades were mediocre in high school.
Units Completed: 53 units
GE(s):
[] I’m really not sure… I just took a bunch of classes.
Essay:
[ul][li] To be honest, I think my essay is what saved me. In my opinion, I’m very disappointed with my Spring semeser grades. I ended up dropping a class (which was a psych class) and got my first ever C. [/ul][/li]Applied to:
[ul][li] USC[/li][]UCLA, Cal, UCSD, UCI (I applied to 4 UCs and before I dropped my Psych class, I had two classes planned for the summer so that I can meet the 60 unit requirement)
[/ul]
Accepted to: USC
