So my best friend got into cornell, and I’m happy for him but I’m extremely jealous at the same time. He found out 2 weeks ago and waited until now to tell me because he felt bad. I’m not going to say he doesn’t deserve it, he really truly does… But I’m just mad at myself for not trying as hard as he did. Cornell is where my parents and I always dreamed of me going. University of Miami was almost a dream school because of the weather and because my parents are moving there in 2 years, but Cornell is the one college I can honestly say I know and love. I got accepted into the summer college last year and have credits from Cornell, and have also visited 4-5 times, but I know there is nothing else I can do. My poor grades and judgement really screwed me now. I know I won’t get into Cornell on April 1st unless there is some kind of cruel joke played on me or some miracle, but I’ve heard of people transfering in and saying it is easier to get in that way. If I went to Binghamton for a year, what would I need to do to get into Cornell my Sophmore year. I am willing to try my hardest now and do what it takes. I just need guidelines to follow so I can make this happen. Please help and don’t criticize me, I’m not in the mood to hear that it’s all my fault or that I’m just whining.
Cornell is actually pretty reasonable when it comes to transfer (4,000 apply and 800 are admitted), but you will need the grades to justify it. First of all, you want to finish your senior year with very strong grades. Transfers are still expected to submit their HS transcripts, and strong senior year grades can only help. Secondly, your college GPA must be very high (3.8+). Thirdly, Cornell will ask for your SAT/ACT and SAT 2. Those will not count as much as they did when you applied for freshman admissions, but they will count. So if you did poorly in them, try to take them again, either in May/June or October.
Good luck…and do not envy your best friend. In fact, learn to be happy for him.
@Alexandre my understanding is colleges won’t accept SATs taken as a college student because the tests were designed for HS students. If that is the case the OP would need to take the tests before October.
Good point Erin’s Dad. So May or June tests.
Commit yourself fully to excelling at Binghamton. It’s a strong school so a high GPA and accomplishments there will look good.
I agree with JayDee. Also, Cornell will be more comfortable with admitting a transfer from Binghamton than one from Miami because the odds of the Binghamton applicant accepting the offer is greater. Besides, Binghamton may also cost a lot less, so you get to save your folks some money.
“Cornell is actually pretty reasonable when it comes to transfer (4,000 apply and 800 are admitted)…”
That depends.
-Admission is done by college there, and the degree of “reasonableness” varies by college.
For example, for Fall 2011 the College of Arts & Sciences admitted 7.5% of transfer applicants.
https://dpb.cornell.edu/documents/1000156.pdf
That’s the last transfer breakdown by college I’ve seen, but the U is admitting yet a smaller percentage of applicants overall since then.
- For the "contract colleges" primarily, the admit rate data is confounded by applicants who hold Guaranteed Transfers (ie they were offfered conditional deferred admission when they applied previously for freshmen admission) and applicants subject to articulation agreements between those colleges of the university and certain community colleges, for certain specific majors. The actual admit rate for non-GT, non-articulation agreement transfers at these colleges has not been published, as far as I've ever seen. Without information on the GT/AA admits, the degree of admissions "reasonableness" of these colleges for "unhooked" transfer applicants cannot really be accurately determined.
- If you apply to, and then enroll, in a particular college there, you have to fulfill the major and in-college course requirements of that particular college/major in order to graduate. They each have different curricula/ requirements.
@Alexandre @"Erin’s Dad" So the most important thing by far is the college GPA? Like a perfect GPA can really shoot up chances provided my other stats are decent?
@qpalzm13 I might be in the same boat as you come April 1st. 
You might want to consider going to Binghamton for a bachelor degree but get a master degree at Cornell. By the time you are done from transferring from Binghamton to Cornell, you will waste time and it will take longer just to get one degree. A bachelor at a lower college and a master at Cornell is cheaper than 4 years at Cornell. If you don’t want a masters degree then just transfer to Cornell during after one year at Binghamton. Just saying if you are going to be in school for 5 years because of a transfer, then might as well go to school for an extra year to get a masters degree at Cornell. That would be impressive for employers and will give you 4 years to prep your GPA for Cornell.
jritch - that’s not necessarily true, especially if the OP goes to Binghamton. We have a family friend who transferred into Cornell from Geneseo and graduated a semester early (January). He worked hard but it was worth it for him. Everyone else I know who transferred from a SUNY school into Cornell graduated in the standard four years. But chances for acceptance does depend on your desired major/school within the University, especially the state school divisions vs. the private divisions.
Anyway there is no automatic path to transfer in from Binghamton, or most other places. Your best chance would be to excel wherever you are, obviously. And present a compelling case in your essays.
If , upon examination, one of the contract colleges (or the Hotel school) has a curriculum/major that suits your academic needs, then my best guess is you should take the same set of courses specified for the GTs to that college (you’ll have to find those out somehow),excel in those, and apply for transfer to that college. The specific courses you take are important I think, because the contract colleges have to pay the College of Arts & Sciences if you still need to take them at Cornell. That makes you less economically attractive to them, I’m guessing.
If that college/major happens to be one that is subject to one of the articulation agreements (you’d have to find out whch those are, somehow), your surest path might be to attend one of the community colleges that is party to such agreement, take the courses specified pursuant to the articulation agreement and meet (or more safely, widely exceed) the specified standards for transfer admission under the articulation agreement.
I was hoping to get in to/ transfer into CALS. (College of Agriculture and Life Sciences). Does anyone know anything about getting in there?
What are your test scores
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Like a perfect GPA
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well, keep in mind, if you apply to be a sophomore transfer, you will only have one semester of college grades at that point.
"I was hoping to get in to/ transfer into CALS. (College of Agriculture and Life Sciences). Does anyone know anything about getting in there? "
The link I gave in #6 has admissions stats by college, but it has the limitations in utility I described there. There is no published information detailing academic profiles (eg GPA and SAT data) for admitted transfer applicants so far as I’m aware. If that’s the case, anything anybody tells you is just somebody’s guess. You can look at past CC transfer admit threads on the Cornell subforum (where this entire thread should probably be moved to) to see some past results.
CALS has the additional wrinkle that majors must be specified at the time of application, and the difficulty of admissions to each CALS major varies. I’ve read that AEM and Biology are very selective. Some of the others are likely less so, possibly the very same ones that are the subject of the articulation agreements. But I don’t know which those are.
@mom2collegekids 2230 SAT and 800 on SAT Math 2 and Physics. Class rank 2/428. Downside is that I am an international applicant and so it much tougher for us.
Let me just speak a bit in regards to your best friend getting in. If you don’t get in, but he did, then yeah it’ll suck. But please be happy for him. Don’t resent him because of this. Last year, my best friend and I both got into Cornell. All of our other friends got rejected. They were ridiculously mean to us after that, said awful things both behind our backs and to our faces, ostracized us, told us we wouldn’t succeed at cornell, etc. It was awful because they turned what was a really exciting moment into a painful few months and I lost some of my best friends because of it. As it turns out, one of them ended up going to binghamton and she is making the most out of it. But in the meantime, regardless of whether you get in or not, please be supportive of your friend.
Enroll at a college with a Cornell articulation agreements. Just take the specified courses, get straight A grades, and then transfer.
There are many good colleges in New York. The smaller SUNY colleges offer a more personal experience at an affordable cost.
My son applied to Cornell and was rejected but offered a Transfer Option. He went to Binghamton for a year took the required course for his major with a GPA of above 3.0. He got accepted as a transfer student last year in CALS. He is very happy and doing well at Cornell this year. You need to look at the required courses( search at their website under transfer option) and make sure you take those requirements for the major you are going to apply for and maintain an above B average in all your courses. Even if you stay at Binghamton, it is a great college. My son’s friends who studied computer science there got good job offers from Amazon and Google before they graduate. It is not the college you go to that makes you successful; it is what you do and learn from there. Good luck.