Hey guys!
I am currently a student at NC state and I’m considering transferring. I’ve been in Raleigh pretty much my whole life and I’m tired of being around the same environment all the time and want to go somewhere that is better at CS, preferably in the north or the midwest.
My stats are GPA: 3.79 SAT:1470 and I had a 4.1 weighted in high school.
Here are some schools I’m looking at: Upenn, Carnegie Mellon, Cornell, Berkeley, Yale, USC, University of Michigan, UCLA, Brown, GT, Duke, Northwestern, Rice, Johns Hopkins, UVA, UT, WashU, Vandy.
What are my chances in getting in at these schools?
None of us can tell you where you will be admitted. All of those are difficult for transfers. Consider them all reaches, and apply to the ones you truly like best.
And can you afford the cost of those other schools?
Not completely impossible. Penn, Yale, Brown, Duke, and Northwestern are definitely reaches for anyone as their acceptance rates fluctuate anywhere from 1% to 8%. I suggest you try finding schools that are a good fit for you as a transfer applicant. Based on your experience from NC State, you should have a good idea of what kind of college campus you want now. For example, schools like Brown and Penn are going to be very different in terms of the campus atmosphere.
This looks like mostly a prestige move not an academic move (apparently your itchy feet would be soothed by walking on Duke grass) or your list would look rather different! Some of those places are a step down for CS, not a step up.
Further the places where it would be a step up tend to be extra hard to transfer to (eg UCB).
And, not your question but will your parents pay for these colleges?
Do some more homework, learn more about their actual programs & figure out which ones are the best fit for you & that you can afford. I suspect that will help you narrow your list down.