Okay so here is my ordeal. I am currently a junior in highschool and Washington State offers a program called Running Start, which is near identical to a Dual Enrollment program. I have qualified for the program but I’m worried that by taking community college classed, I will be ineligible for the TAG Program for UC colleges. After highschool, I plan to attend a CCC for 2 years, then transfer over to a UC college via the TAG program.
I know people who have taken CC classes to finish high school through a dual enrollment program. The classes they completed in the program were not able to be used as college credit, as they were just about all high school level classes. That may have been their fault (bad planning, lower-level courses, etc.), but still, it may be a hassle you might not want to deal with.
If I were you, I would just graduate high school the old fashioned way and come to California. That way you won’t be rushing it, you’ll be sure classes transfer over, and so forth. I’m sure you can take classes at a CC in Washington and then come to CA, but it might be hassle that isn’t worth the trouble.
TAG is good, but aiming specifically for that somewhat limits your options, unless your dream school is attainable through it. It’s very possible to transfer to Cal through CCC’s, UCLA (the generally idealized California college), as well as UCSD. There are plenty of routes to take. As someone who just graduated high school recently and is currently in CCC, I’d again just recommend just finishing high school. You can take AP classes to prepare for college, and if you do well on AP tests, you can get credit for courses when you start CCC.
(I only took one AP class in high school and got a passing score on the AP Literature and Composition exam; that knocked out beginning English requirements and was extremely helpful. I also took a CC class in high school to knock out Algebra 2, which allowed me to immediately take Statistics and finish my math requirements early. Surely CC’s can help, but AP classes are generally great as well, and are definitely comparable to college classes.)
If you really wish to do this program, I’d talk to the counselors at that school as well as counselors from the CCC you want to attend (SBCC has some notoriety, for example) and email counselors/admissions officers from a UC school. It is very likely that you’ll be able to transfer classes from a WCC to a CCC, but honestly, AP classes are comparable, and arguably almost better than introductory CC classes, for whatever that’s worth.
I’m not really using the dual enrollment program to earn college credit, I’m using it more to get a taste of what I’m going to need to do to qualify. I don’t plan for the credits to transfer at all.
What I’m mainly worried about is will attending a non-Californian community college before taking a California community college ruin my elibility for TAG.
I think you’d be okay to take WCC classes. It might help you to have only one year at a CCC to save money.
If anything, you might need to make sure the classes will articulate to your CCC. Do you know which one you’ll be attending? It might be worth an email to their admissions department to see what will and will not match.
Do you think that I could take the classes in CCC for the TAG program in WCC, then retake them when I get to a CCC without any repercussions?
Thankfully, my college tuition will be paid for by my parents and the dual enrollment program in Washington is free to attend.
Sometimes CCCs don’t allow you to repeat classes if you already have the credit for a similar class. This is due to high demand for classes. Plus, why waste the time re-doing everything?
Look at some possible CCCs. Do some research to see if the WCC credits will transfer. Spend your junior and senior year doing WCC credits, then a year at CCC getting at least 30 units, and you’re eligible for TAG.
http://admission.universityofcalifornia.edu/counselors/files/tag-matrix.pdf
Also, https://uctap.universityofcalifornia.edu/students/index.cfm can be used to organize and submit your TAG app.
Hey, thank you for taking the time to help me out. My parents have been pretty critical about this so hopefully I can create some sort of presentation for them.
It sounds like an excellent plan to me!
I’d show them what classes you are planning to take while in HS, then which CCC you’ve chosen, followed by the estimated cost of attendance, cost of housing, cost of applying, then summarize the TAG program and why your are eligible for it.
I might be a bit of the curmudgeon and only for one reason. Unless you pretty much can assure you’ll get As, not sure if you should chance it. If they end up being non-transferable, it’s irrelevant. But I’ve run into a lot of kids who took community college courses at age 17, etc and later wish they hadn’t because it kind of messed up their GPA. The question is really how well you think you’ll do. You should try to get feedback from other attendees re: ease of grades, etc.
And in one way I agree with parents: if you’re planning to go the CCC route, then there really isn’t a lot of point, necessarily. (Unless they transfer, but you might not know- which opens another can of worms. If you need it to fulfill something and you aren’t sure…)
^Excellent point.
@Muneyy I did WA state running start in Vancouver and am now a CA CC student applying to UC’s. I will post the do’s/don’ts and pro’s/cons after class. I’ve been there!
Ok, here’s the info:
doing head start is an awesome way to get ahead on CC classes. I absolutely loved the program, and encourage you to take part if you are ready: responsible enough to go to class, study diligently outside of school, get help when you need it. These grades will stay with you forever, so don’t slack off.
The worst thing is I got royally screwed when I transferred to CA CC because I went from a quarter system to a semester system. What this means is that any class that was only one quarter long transferred as 2/3 of a semester and I didn’t get credit for completing any of the 1 semester class requirements. For example: English 101 in WA was not enough to fulfill English 101 in CA. Luckily I took English 101 and 102, and the two of these are accepted (at CC and UC) TOGETHER to fulfill the English 101 requirement. This is still a little crappy because I took 2 10-week quarters and got credit for 1 16-week semester (a loss).
Now for sequential courses, such as General Chemistry (3 quarters long/2 semesters long) its a little better because finishing the 3 quarters will directly correlate to completing the 2 semesters here. Where I really lost credit were incomplete sequences and 1 qtr electives.
I completed the first quarter (of three) for chemistry in WA. When I came to CA CC I had to take the first course again because my 1 quarter class did not fulfill the 1 semester pre-requisite for the second class. This is a waste of your time at CC and will create ambiguity when guessing what your transfer GPA will be to UC, because UC sees that as taking the same class twice.
I know it seems like going from a qtr system CC to qtr system UC shouldn’t be that big an issue, but the real problems arise in clearing pre-requisites at the semester CC in between.
My first suggestion is to figure out what CA CC you will go to and see if they are on a semester or quarter system, and try to attend the same in WA.
If this is not possible, you need to take your classes with the transfer of credits in mind, and take only full sequences if possible so you aren’t losing credits (i.e. general chemistry 1-3). I would avoid electives unless they are very general (likely taught everywhere), have a class that sounds the same at your CA CC (check the catalog), and offers 2 consecutive classes on he topic. Example: American history pre-revolution & American history post-revolution would likely fulfill requirements for a 1 semester american history class in CA. Also political science 101 & 102 in WA might fulfill Intro to Political science in CA, or Photography 1 & 2 to fulfill Photography for Beginners in CA.
If someone had ever told me this I would have saved about 2 years of college work.
Taking CC classes in WA will in no way disqualify you from TAG. UCSB used to have a line in their TAG agreement that said an eligible student may have only taken college courses in CA, but that was removed this year.
I would check with someone more knowledgeable about matters of residency. I myself moved to CA and waited to establish residency (2 years, had a job, lease in my name, DL, etc) before going to CCC. Bonus was I was eligible for in state tuition and a credit fee waiver, so I got most of it for free once I started attending. I had heard that UC would not consider you a resident if you were a student the whole time after you moved to CA. So you might get stuck paying OOS tuition for CC and UC (ouch). Depending on your age at the time, if neither parent lives in CA you would be OOS regardless. I recommend looking over UC’s protocol for determining residency and be sure you can meet their requirements if financially necessary.
My last piece of information you should consider is that the TAG program is considered by many to be on its deathbed. It may have a few years left but its hard to say. UCB, UCLA, and UCSD do not accept it. The lower tier UC’s have limited it to exclude some majors. The TAG eligibility GPA for each campus keeps increasing and pre-requisites are more strictly enforced. You have 3 years before you’ll be applying for transfer, and with current budget issues and the evolution of the TAG program, the landscape of TAG admissions may look very different then. However, you will still have a much better shot at CCC–>UC transfer than WCC–>UC transfer, even without TAG.
Meet with a counselor at your local CC that you’d be doing running start at, and discuss your plans. Search their catalog descriptions of classes and match them up with the catalog at your target CCC to be sure it will transfer. Its a great plan, you just need to be on point and do some leg-work before enrolling to be sure you aren’t wasting the opportunity.
I loved running start. It really defined my senior year and I don’t think I would have graduated without it. I was way over high school by then and probably would have dropped out if I wasn’t able to just start college.
Best of luck to you.
You can email admin at the UCs that offer TAG to ask if it affects eligibility, but I don’t see anything in the TAG rules that says it would.
More troubling is “I don’t plan for the credits to transfer”. You can’t choose not to report colleges you attended. The UCs require you to list them all and send transcripts. Don’t think of “forgetting” since there is a national database and they’ll catch you over the summer when they do their final checks, then rescind you for a dishonest application. So the grades will count, perhaps in your college GPA (not sure about that one), and if they choose to give you units then that’s what will happen and you can’t retake the class for a grade at UC or CCC.
edit: probably the only way you can not get college credit that you’ve earned is thru the AP test “Score Withholding” service. Most colleges give extra points in your GPA for taking AP classes but don’t require you to take the AP test. My guess is that by “Score Withholding” they simply don’t put the class(es) on your report, but I’m not sure.
I missed that. Your college classes will absolutely count at your transfer CC and your transfer UC. grades and subject credit count. Forever.