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Is it worth transferring schools?

ter1413

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Has Cam Newton chimed in on this chat?
 

ConcernedParent

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Originally Posted by rnoldh
Things must have changed a lot since my college days.

But if you definitely think you would have a chance at transferring to Cornell, Brown, and Dartmouth, then I think you would have a chance to transfer to Columbia too.


The difference in admission requirement between Cornell and Columbia is pretty significant... just standardized testing alone there is like a 100 point gap in the middle 50% across the entire student body. Brown/Dartmouth not so much.

Originally Posted by blackboard_knowledge
I just want you to be aware that the aforementioned schools exempting UCLA are quite difficult to get in to. Even UCLA is an impressive school, and for the record, so is USC.

People may try to feed you lines about finding a school that "fits" with you and your aspirations, but I will be frank that you should try to graduate from the school with the most name cache. This is not out of snobbery, but instead it is about you getting the most of your (or your parents) investment. Even though it is just four years of your life, people will inaccurately use your university as a quick mental shortcut to gauge your intelligence and in the working world, to decide how qualified you are against other candidates. I am almost ten years out of undergrad, and my alma mater still alma matters.

One things that is also rarely considered by students is the quality of the school's alumni network. The alumni network can be a fantastic vehicle in the professional world.

I have an investment banking and consulting background and would say that in general, the working world outside of California perceives USC and UCLA as less competitive or sought after than the other schools that you mentioned. However, they are respectable schools.


Thanks.

That sounds reasonable, I'll work hard and give it a shot. If not, I guess there's just no remedy or cover for stupid
biggrin.gif
.

Quick note: UCLA and Berkeley are really the same in terms of admission requirements... Berkeley's historic prestige and far stronger grad departments are what I assume give it the edge outside of Cali?
 

gomestar

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Originally Posted by ConcernedParent
The difference in admission requirement between Cornell and Columbia is pretty significant... just standardized testing alone there is like a 100 point gap in the middle 50% across the entire student body. Brown/Dartmouth not so much.

what about Cornell arts + sciences and engineering compared to Columbia? I recon the difference would be significantly smaller when we compare apples to apples. To be fair, Cornell's numbers are dragged down by the Hotel school and Art/Arch school (and to some extent te ag school) as both tend to put much less emphasis on SATs than other measures (art/arch is all about the portfolio, while Hotel is heavily slanted to students with hospitality/restaurant experience). Not to knock the schools, necessarily, the arch program has an admit rate on par with HYP anyways.
 

Cotillion

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Originally Posted by ConcernedParent
Quick note: UCLA and Berkeley are really the same in terms of admission requirements... Berkeley's historic prestige and far stronger grad departments are what I assume give it the edge outside of Cali?


One thing to keep in mind about transferring to either UCLA or Berkeley from a 4 yr university is that transfer priority is given to community college transfer students over students at other 4 year Universities. That is due to California's 'Master Plan' on Higher Education.

Being that you are a sophomore, you really have to apply now before Nov.30 for University of California. You pretty much need to transfer in as a Junior and UC does not offer rolling admissions. UC (to the best of my knowledge) does not accept transfer applications for people starting their Senior year. To get your degree from Cal or UCLA you have to complete a certain number of upper division Units at that University so you pretty much need to go in as a Junior.

If you still want to try it this year, you really need to make sure you have IGETC fulfilled since as Philo you'd be going into Letters and Science at Berkeley (not sure the UCLA equivalent off top of my head).

The best resource to check your current courses is Assist.org:
http://www.assist.org/web-assist/welcome.html

If you want more information you can PM me and I will send you email to the transfer counselors/admissions officers you'd need to talk to which I would really advise you get on ASAP if you are serious.

Since you are considering Law School, it might just be better to stay at SC, get the best grades possible and prepare for Columbia, Uof Chi or Boalt law schools.
 

Pelikan2

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Originally Posted by Valor
Unless you think you're very competitive, I wouldn't transfer if you want to go to law school. As other posters have said, it's 95% GPA/LSATs and getting a higher GPA at a better school is a lot harder (cept Harvard). Given that you don't think you can get into Columbia, I would probably stay at USC and work on having a 3.9+ and getting a 165+ on LSATs which should get you into a decent law school (T14 at least) whereas if you had a 165+ and a 3.5 at NYU you wouldn't get into the same schools, same goes for a 3.2 at Columbia.

Exactly this.
 

andrewh

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This is true, with a caveat--if you want to work in SoCal, the USC alumni network can get you a great consulting or banking job, on par with top-5 universities. (UCLA can't...even though it's comparable academically, it lacks the strong alumni network).

Outside of SoCal, you'd need to go to a school with more national prestige (Ivy's, Stanford, etc.).

I also have a consulting / banking background, and this was one of the interesting things I noticed while working in different cities.
 

andrewh

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Of the schools you listed...

Cornell, Brown, Darmouth, Northwestern --> Yes, I would transfer.

UChicago, Berkeley --> Depends. If you're planning to work in SoCal after graduation, USC's alumni network will oftentimes get you better jobs than either UChicago or Berkeley, and you wouldn't have to deal with the trouble of transferring. If leaving SoCal, I"d probably transfer.

UCLA --> No, unless you're doing it for the reduced tuition. I don't think the cost-benefits would add up.
 

Dewey

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Originally Posted by bach
i'm taking an upper div philos class this semester and the grading is really tough. i haven't opened the book or taken the 2 prereqs though.
laugh.gif
i hope that's a joke . . . don't be a fool
Originally Posted by Cotillion
One thing to keep in mind about transferring to either UCLA or Berkeley from a 4 yr university is that transfer priority is given to community college transfer students over students at other 4 year Universities. That is due to California's 'Master Plan' on Higher Education. Being that you are a sophomore, you really have to apply now before Nov.30 for University of California. You pretty much need to transfer in as a Junior and UC does not offer rolling admissions. UC (to the best of my knowledge) does not accept transfer applications for people starting their Senior year. To get your degree from Cal or UCLA you have to complete a certain number of upper division Units at that University so you pretty much need to go in as a Junior. If you still want to try it this year, you really need to make sure you have IGETC fulfilled since as Philo you'd be going into Letters and Science at Berkeley (not sure the UCLA equivalent off top of my head). The best resource to check your current courses is Assist.org: http://www.assist.org/web-assist/welcome.html If you want more information you can PM me and I will send you email to the transfer counselors/admissions officers you'd need to talk to which I would really advise you get on ASAP if you are serious. Since you are considering Law School, it might just be better to stay at SC, get the best grades possible and prepare for Columbia, Uof Chi or Boalt law schools.
that is some high quality advice. not sure it's accurate but i do recognize that not many people have that knowledge on the tip of their tongue.
Originally Posted by andrewh
This is true, with a caveat--if you want to work in SoCal, the USC alumni network can get you a great consulting or banking job, on par with top-5 universities. (UCLA can't...even though it's comparable academically, it lacks the strong alumni network).
not sure what you'd want to do with your degree but in general i think the "quality" of a BA is overrated. you either have one, or you don't. and it can be an advantage to have the BA that a lot of people have, since in general all that matters to employers is that you have it. and if you have a BA from the same school as the person doing the hiring, that's a plus. for this reason the value of any given BA degree is much higher in the geographic region where the alums typically live. the idea that an ivy BA will help you in the average case, in CA, over a USC degree . . . i really doubt that. ivies like to say think their degrees are more respected by everyone but that is not the case. there are industries where this matters but it is not standard. the best BA you can have in almost any hiring situation is the same one as the person doing the hiring. one other thing with transferring . . . i am sure your first two years at USC included a lot of general education work. because colleges and unis are independent, the gen ed programs are different everywhere. transfer students are almost always screwed. your 40 credits of gen ed at one place is received as 30 of the 40 gen ed at another place, plus (this is the killer) 10 credits of elective. transferring mid-stream is worse than changing money at the airport. you might be 50% done at USC but it's likely you'll transfer in as 40-45% done at the new school. not sure how the california system works though. perhaps you could go to cal and the gen eds are the same. nationwide the trend is for govs etc. to pressure the state systems to get on the same page and offer more the same in terms of gen ed requirements. i would stick it out at usc and make the best of it. get your BA and enjoy it and then do what you need to do to go to your graduate school of your choice. if grad school, law school, etc. is not the immediate option then do internships and gather professional work experience however you can.
 

deadly7

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Originally Posted by Dewey
i would stick it out at usc and make the best of it. get your BA and enjoy it and then do what you need to do to go to your graduate school of your choice. if grad school, law school, etc. is not the immediate option then do internships and gather professional work experience however you can.

This. Ultimately if you want to do anything outside of undergrad (which, with a BA in philosophy seems likely) kick ass wherever you are and you'll be a strong contender anywhere you apply. Nobody, other than people that either are jealous of Ivies or went to Ivies, gives a **** if you went to Harvard or USC.
 

pebblegrain

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I would tell you sure, go for it transfer. Except isn't it pretty ******* late to be trying to transfer in as a Junior?
 

bach

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Originally Posted by pebblegrain
I would tell you sure, go for it transfer. Except isn't it pretty ******* late to be trying to transfer in as a Junior?
read the op. he said he didn't have great stats out of hs. you need to pull down A's for more than a semester if you want dartmouth, brown, and other schools of that caliber. additionally, ucla and cal only accept junior transfers.
 

pebblegrain

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Originally Posted by bach
read the op. he said he didn't have great stats out of hs. you need to pull down A's for more than a semester if you want dartmouth, brown, and other schools of that caliber.

he made it sound like he got into both UCLA and NYU? can't be that bad...
 

bach

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Originally Posted by pebblegrain
he made it sound like he got into both UCLA and NYU? can't be that bad...
well the hs stats needed to get into nyu/ucla are a lot different than the ones you need to get into places like columbia and berkeley (lol). applying as a sophomore transfer is pretty much like applying from high school because you haven't done much other than take a semester of freshman courses. op didn't have the grades/scores in high school, so yeah... one semester of college grades isn't going to change their minds.
 

ConcernedParent

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Thanks for the advice. I figure from here I'll just give it a shot and apply broadly, and if I don't get it, so it goes... I guess you just can't hide stupid for that long. I still have a long time to think about it.

Originally Posted by pebblegrain
he made it sound like he got into both UCLA and NYU? can't be that bad...

I did but...

Originally Posted by bach
well the hs stats needed to get into nyu/ucla are a lot different than the ones you need to get into places like columbia and berkeley (lol).

This.

But instead of Berkeley, which again I say, has basically identical stats with UCLA for undergrads. For example, 2050 SAT makes you competitive for UCLA, Berk, NYU, USC... it makes your application a joke for Columbia. My test scores are Ivy League competitive, my highschool transcript however is one collective lulz (hint: when your college gpa is higher, you have a huge problem).

Originally Posted by bach
applying as a sophomore transfer is pretty much like applying from high school because you haven't done much other than take a semester of freshman courses. op didn't have the grades/scores in high school, so yeah... one semester of college grades isn't going to change their minds.

bigstar[1].gif
. I swear I'm going to ride you so hard (wait, what?) for info on Berkeley life that you will wish you never messaged me on that one faithful night.
inlove.gif
 

bach

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Originally Posted by ConcernedParent
For example, 2050 SAT makes you competitive for UCLA, Berk, NYU, USC... it makes your application a joke for Columbia.
nitpicking here, but the average berkeley sat is like 2030, so 2050 isn't like AUTO ADMIT or anything. also, 25% of columbia admits have an sat of around 2050 or lower, so not a complete joke.
Originally Posted by ConcernedParent
bigstar[1].gif
. I swear I'm going to ride you so hard (wait, what?) for info on Berkeley life that you will wish you never messaged me on that one faithful night.
inlove.gif

you never replied. i must say i'm pretty butthurt, no ****.
 

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