Academic History; unaccredited schools

wharrgarbl
Wed, 18 Nov 2009 14:24:58 +0000

I’ve got a bit of a poser in regards to the academic history section of the UC app.

7 years ago, when I was young, naive, and immature, I decided that I really wanted to go to art school. My family comes from an arts background, I’m pretty talented, etc, etc, it seemed like the smart thing to do. Bottom line is that I spent a year there and fell flat on my face. I don’t think I actually failed any classes, but I did withdraw from a few before I decided that getting out was probably the smart thing to do.

About two years ago I decided to go back to school with a new focus, and new-found maturity (amazing what a few years in the legal industry will do for a person’s sense of responsibility), and since returning I’ve maintained a 4.0 GPA at my local CC.

Now, here’s my question. As of now my app features all the gory detail of my art school experiment. I’m not really ashamed of it; in the long run I think it was probably beneficial, and my experience there is the focus of one of my personal statements. However, the school was unaccredited at the time of my attendance. As such, do I need to include it on my app (as I’ve done), or should I go ahead and pull it off? The only reason I ask is that I can’t find any of my records from my time there, and I’m getting the run-around from the registrar about getting my grades. I know what classes I took, just not what I grade I received. I don’t see an “unknown grade” selection in the course history part of the app, so I’m in a bit of a bind.

If anyone here has some advice, I’d be very grateful if you shared it.

Thanks!