I was at a 4 year uni, and placed on suspension for poor grades. This was about 2 years ago.
I was suspended in a physics major, and I want to continue with this same major.
I then went to a CC, took physics and math courses, and received As and Bs. (My uni gpa was a 2.6)
I’ve done alot of volunteering, and clubs during college.
Are there ANY colleges in New York state, California, or in Boston that will accept someone with a similar profile?
(Hispanic, female)
Your story sounds so similar to mine that I logged in just to respond to this. Yes, there will definitely be a school that is willing to take you. I can’t speak for New York/Boston, but I know that if you went to a CC in California, you will receive priority consideration for the UC’s. Like you, I started off with a poor first year at a 4 year college (also had a sub-3.0 GPA), then went to a California CC for 2 years where I fulfilled all my major requirements and just transferred to UC Irvine as an Electrical Engineering major. If the schools you are considering have affirmative action policies, I think you may even have better chances than I did, since you are an underrepresented minority in a STEM major. (I am female too, but East Asian, which is not really much of a diversity boost in a field like engineering :P)
I think your best bet is to talk to admissions officers at any schools you may be interested in attending, and let them know about your situation. If you are able to fulfill your lower division requirements at a CC with good grades, I don’t see any reason why they shouldn’t admit you.
You’re ok with the UCs.
Good for you in getting your academics back on track! As a physics professor, I am happy to see someone like yourself determined to get her degree in physics. In my opinion, you should be able to get into a number of programs which can give you an excellent physics education. We just graduated a student who failed at a large 4-year school, came back home and completed 2 years at a Community College and then came to Illinois Tech and graduated top of his class. He will start in the Ph.D. program at University of Wisconsin - Madison in the fall with full support as a Teaching Assistant.
As you plan to get back to a 4-year university, you might want to think of the kind of program that will best suit you, however. Apart from financial considerations, which probably are the most important, you may wish to go to a smaller program if you had a hard time at a large school your first time around. It is possible that you could succeed more easily in a program which gives you closer contact with the faculty and smaller classes. There are many such programs in the states you mention and other states as well. The curriculum in physics is pretty standard all over the country. I run the graduate program in physics at IIT and I see that all our incoming graduate students tend to use the same textbooks for their undergraduate courses. This means that you just need to find a program that matches your financial needs and gives you the learning atmosphere that works best for you.