<p>Realistically your daughter won’t be able to transfer for some time. However, the school across the city, USC happily takes sophomore transfers (two of my classmates from Oxford of Emory went there after the first year). It gives OOS financial aid and has dramatically improved in quality over the past 20 years.</p>
<p>You got your answer: they don’t accept spring transfers. </p>
<p>People are just trying to discuss your issue. If you don’t want discussion, you should not be posting to an online forum.</p>
<p>Why I advocate for a gap year.
Many 17 year olds don’t yet have the life experience they need to make a reasoned choice regarding where they will spend their time and thousands of dollars.
As her reasoning for preferring an out of state flagship over an instate flagship seems somewhat vague, I’m still wondering exactly what it is about UCLA that is worth taking out loans that you couldn’t afford 5 months ago.</p>
<p>^^^UCLA is pretty special. I get it.
Perhaps the OP doesn’t feel like sharing all of her daughter’s thoughts on an anonymous message board, and she just wants info on transferring. The “whys” aren’t really our business.
I hope your daughter can find a satisfactory situation for next year, WAmom, and is able to go to UCLA later if she still wants to. Good luck.</p>
<p>You don’t think the whys can help other families?
Transferring info is best gotten from the school.
But I agree the space is filled by now, although since OOS students have a higher admittance rate than instate, there is always a possibility she can get in for a later term.</p>
<p>Considering that Pepperdine is one of the most expensive private schools in California, she must have gotten some kind of amazing scholarship to make it affordable. She should be grateful for that. It’s also in one of the most beautiful locations (Malibu). It’s not like she’s going to school in Fresno or Bakersfield. Another reason to be grateful. Who wouldn’t want to spend four years in Malibu? Yes, it is conservative/Christian, but you all must have known that when she applied/spent a day there. Has she specifically expressed why she is unhappy? If not, she may not be unhappy with Pepperdine, but just having general adjustment problems to being away from home. </p>
<p>As a Bruin, and mother of a Bruin, I can tell you UCLA is far more diverse and tolerant, but also much, much bigger. According to my D, it’s hard to fit in there as a transfer student. If bigger and more diverse is what she wantes, then she could go to her state flagship. No matter what, she’s probably blown her chances of going to UCLA now. IMHO, she would be better off giving Pepperdine a chance, or going home for a while and working while she matures a little.</p>
<p>Let’s be fair: Pepperdine is a very unusual school. Very conservative, very Christian, very white, pretty small, on the beach, with students heavily from one area of California. Not a particular broad curriculum. I think some religious requirements (don’t know if those have changed in the past decade). Very wealthy student body. I expect this has more to do with Pepperdine than with UCLA.</p>
<p>I know what it is like not to “fit”, though my experiece was 40 years ago. I stuck it out for four years, did very well, and got a great education for which I am grateful. But I could never say I liked it (though I didn’t know any better), and wouldn’t do it again.</p>
<p>Since UCLA is not currently an option (and likely won’t be for at least 23 months), the choices are: stick it out until junior year; drop out and take a gap year; transfer to a community college; transfer to another four-year college. </p>
<p>Things have a way of working themselves out. Good luck.</p>
<p>OP, I know you want to confine the comments to a specific answer to your question (which apparently was an easy “no”), but you have to understand that this is not how discussion forums work. You’ve raised an issue–a kid wanting to transfer after just 6 weeks at school–that will be of interest to many people and may be directly relevant to some who are getting similar tales from their own freshmen or fear the same will happen next fall. The discussion will be of interest to them. You don’t have to pay attention when the responses are not what you’re looking for, but you can’t take offense. That said, I’ll make my contribution, which OP can ignore:
I have to say, I have no clue what that even means. I’m not familiar with Pepperdine, but it’s hard for me to imagine that the school, the students and the faculty are so unusual that OP’s D can’t “connect” with them. I wouldn’t buy that as an adequate reason were this my child. Kids are kids. Profs are profs. They really don’t vary that wildly from school to school, assuming the school is an appropriate match academically. My guess is there’s something else going on here to make her so miserable. The girl has focused on UCLA as THE one place she will “belong”, but why would you believe that her aptitude for selecting the right school is any better now than it was a few months ago? If she were my kid, I’d tell her that she has to stick it out for the year and can explore her transfer options over winter break–and I say that as a mother whose son did exactly that! He disliked his first college because it turned out he hated living in a large city at a large school where the focus of student activity was off campus–specific and concrete reasons that led him to transfer to a small suburban LAC. Not “connecting” would not have been a comprehensible justification for me to support his decision.</p>
<p>MommaJ, I’m going to echo the other posters familiar with Pepperdibe, it’s a very unusual school and it’s extremely possible that a girl drawn to UCLA would not be able to fit in with those at Pepperdine. In SoCal, it attracts a lot of very wealthy, very conservative (politically and religiously) students. A student who grew up in Washington might be shocked by the lack of racial diversity as well as the subtle and overt displays of wealth. </p>
<p>I had major difficulty connecting with students at my first school (few hardcore STEM nerds) but have socially thrived at my new institution. The reality is, small privates often attract a specific type of student and if someone doesn’t fit the mold, it can be a somewhat socially isolating experience.</p>
<p>OP, I found CC in the first place as my D looked to change majors and colleges. But it was after staying in place for a year, not 6 weeks. I got some good advice, and some private message criticism. It was all good because it made me look at angles I had not considered. My D wanted to transfer for many reasons but they went beyond not fitting in. She is living back in Seattle, working and taking CC classes-it’s been exactly what she needed. I would not have thought to let her take that route had I not posted here.</p>
<p>As a disinterested bystander, it looks like you’ve made the decision-let your D transfer to UCLA, and just want us to agree with you on that and tell you how it’s done. Only it CAN’T be done, not this year, so people are offering suggestions and asking questions. My advice is to at least pay attention, even if you don’t follow any of the advice. A lot of the people on CC know what they’re talking about. </p>
<p>I am in WA too. You should know that this year’s UW freshman class has more OOS students than ISS. But that’s for the main campus. Your D might be able to start next semester at the Bothell or Tacoma campus, then go to UCLA, if she can get in. Hope it works out for you and your D. Sometimes kids actually DON’T know what’s best for them, other times they just know what ISN’T. Only you can decide which is your D and whether you can afford her choices.</p>
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<p>Pepperdine’s students are 49.2% white. That may be considered “very white” in California (about 30% of UC and CSU undergraduates are white, as are 39% of USC undergraduates and 40% of Stanford undergraduates), but people from other parts of the country may not think of that as “very white” (e.g. UW Seattle is 49.1% white).</p>
<p>Of course, being a small school may mean that a student who does not match the predominant type of student there may not “fit” very well, in comparison to a big university (UCLA or otherwise) where a student is likely to find other students with common interests even if many of the other students have little in common.</p>
<p>People have said it is not possible to transfer to UCLA freshman year. They are asking why she wants to transfer to UCLA because they want to possibly offer an alternative. I don’t know why UCLA is all of a sudden affordable just because the D is unhappy. Hard for me to relate that the family didn’t have a real soul searching discussion about which school they could afford and came up with the best option possible. Now after 6 weeks it is the wrong choice? Parents are now thinking we could take out all these loans so the D could be happy.</p>
<p>Okay, I’ll accept that Pepperdine has characteristics that might make it a poor fit for some. But if these characteristics are so obvious and well known, it seems OP’s D just wasn’t able to evaluate her options intelligently, and there’s no reason to think she will do a better job now, given her focus on one alternative and her desire to flee as soon as possible. Surely her experience suggests that she needs to take it slow and consider many alternatives, rather than just trying to get out of Dodge posthaste. As for the possibility of transferring for spring semester elsewhere, I wouldn’t be surprised if many institutions would turn down a student who had bailed on another school after a single semester–surely that path would raise concerns about instability and lack of self-knowledge.</p>
<p>OP, first, I am sorry that your D is so unhappy. It’s not unusual for kids to be disillusioned as new freshmen, some because they had too many stars in their eyes, some because they really are very young to make this big decision and misjudged the place to begin with, and others because their needs may have changed. It seems your D was making a sacrifice in order to help the family out–which is, in my view, very mature and noble. And, truly, a wise and sound decision with other siblings to come. Now, she’s living in a less desirable school and seems to regret what she may have given up. </p>
<p>I can understand the desire to fix it for the D. But spending $$ one does not have…how can that be justified? As a comment not to the OP but just to the wind (and future families), allowing kids to apply to dream schools that are not affordable leads to heartache. Make lists with good financial safeties.</p>
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<p>If that is the case, then I don’t think you are doing your daughter any favors to encourage further consideration of UCLA. Do you really think that, long term, she would be happier if you burden yourself with loans to give her the school she now thinks she wants? It’s clear right now that a transfer to UCLA isn’t feasible in any event – but even if it were, what would happen a year or so down the line if your d. realized she wasn’t happy at school #2, or she wanted to change majors but would need to spend another year in school to do that and the money isn’t there? It won’t work to take on debt that is more than you were initially comfortable in an attempt to buy happiness for your daughter. You would just be shifting the dynamics, not solving the problem. </p>
<p>It sounds like your daughter confessed to you that she had regrets about her choice, but did not say that she wanted to transfer in the spring. I think she needs your emotional support right now, not your financial support. Give her a chance to grieve the loss of the UCLA dream for awhile, and an opportunity to regroup and consider other options. She cannot transfer to UCLA for the spring, but there is plenty of time for her apply to transfer to another 4 year college beginning with her sophomore year. Let her know that she has your emotional support if she follows that path – but don’t take over. </p>
<p>Part of the maturing process is learning to cope with and move beyond the mistakes we make along the way. We seldom have a chance in life to fix our problems by abandoning the path we took, and retracing our steps to take the other options. </p>
<p>There may be other ways that your daughter can find her niche at her school – so I don’t think you should push the transfer idea. Sometimes you have to let kids work things out for themselves. </p>
<p>If your daughter does decide to transfer to another college, I think you should encourage her to apply to UW or another in-state public as a backup. At least those are financially realistic alternatives. Also, when she was applying last year, she was considering UW as compared to UCLA. If she opts to transfer, then the comparison is something different: UW as compared to Pepperdine.</p>
<p>In any case, in the end what matters is what she does in whatever environment she is in, not whether she “belongs.” Her actions and decisions play a part in reshaping her academic and social environment. She has the ability to identify the aspects of her college life that are most disconcerting to her and form a plan of action to address those. But it needs to be a forward looking decision, not a backward looking one.</p>
<p>I’m sorry the D is unhappy also. Clearly she should call UCLA and find out what their transfer options are although the OP seem to have called for the D and the answer was no for spring. The D should also make a call as it is the D that wants to transfer. I’m guessing the answer will be the same, but the D can ask all the questions she has. The OP has said that money is NOT a factor now so I’m going to set that change of heart aside as it is the OPs business how much they want to spend. If the D has no other options at this point for where she would like to transfer, then I think the D should either finish out the semester and take a leave for the winter semester while she evaluates what is important to her or she can stay put until a transfer to UCLA is possible.</p>
<p>If there is ‘drama’ at play here as can be with newly minted freshman, it may be put to rest by the end of the semester (or quarter - not sure with Pep…) and the issue may be moot.</p>
<p>Our D did the same thing when she chose a school because of a great finanical package that wasn’t a great fit and ended up transferring. We told her to stay for a year then she could always move to one of our instate options that was a good fit and still affordable for us. It sounds as if even though UCLA was her first choice, it isn’t on the table any more, so your daughter must choose a different path. She can stick it out at Pepperdine, or move to another school that she would enjoy that will still fit in your family’s budget. </p>
<p>There are over 3000 schools in the US. There will be another place she can go that she will enjoy even if it isn’t UCLA. I am amazed at the number of friends of my kids who have transferred to a different school for their sophomore year. </p>
<p>Even though my d didn’t get much in the way of scholarships when she transferred, having that great scholarship her freshman year really helped out a lot. My suggestion is to have your daughter try and at least stick it out her freshman year so you can have this time to search and plan for her next move. You don’t want a knee jerk reaction - leave and go to the next place that isn’t a great fit either. Also, if you only have to take out loans for three years that is better than 3 1/2. Or 4 if she leaves now and has to repeat this semester. </p>
<p>In retrospect, D learned a lot about herself and really grew during that freshman year where she was in a situation that wasn’t ideal for her. She got involved in things that were a stretch for her, and even started her own on line business that I really doubt she would have done if she was at her second school. She made the most of the situation and really appreciates her new school that much more because of her experiences.</p>
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<p>UCLA’s website is quite clear. (And it has been their policy for several years now.)</p>
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<p><a href=“http://www.admissions.ucla.edu/prospect/Adm_tr/tradms.htm[/url]”>http://www.admissions.ucla.edu/prospect/Adm_tr/tradms.htm</a></p>
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<p><a href=“http://www.admissions.ucla.edu/faq/tr_before.htm[/url]”>http://www.admissions.ucla.edu/faq/tr_before.htm</a></p>
<p>Enuf said.</p>
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<p>Waste of time – see the website. (Likely won’t even get through to Admissions…)</p>
<p>Last year, 93.5% of UCLA transfer admits were from California community colleges. 3% of transfer admits were from other UC’s, and .94% were from other California schools.</p>
<p>Source: [url=<a href=“http://www.admissions.ucla.edu/prospect/adm_tr/Tr_Prof13.htm]Profile”>http://www.admissions.ucla.edu/prospect/adm_tr/Tr_Prof13.htm]Profile</a> of Admitted Transfer Students, Fall 2013 - UCLA Undergraduate Admissions<a href=“Easy%20to%20find.”>/url</a></p>
<p>Transferring from Pepperdine to UCLA as a junior isn’t a realistic option. Transferring before junior year isn’t a possibility at all.</p>
<p>I just had a discussion about transferring with a friend who went to three schools as an undergrad: spent freshman year at one small LAC, then fall sophomore year at an OOS state university, then onto another small LAC where he finished out his college career. Superficially, one could ask if the guy just ended up where he started but they were two very different schools. So I can see how the OP’s daughter feels out of place at Pepperdine but maybe wants to stay in the same metro area. </p>
<p>That said, if UCLA was unaffordable the first time, what makes it now affordable? The presence of new loans may not mean that taking on debt is a good idea but you know your finances better than anyone else. Just ask, if you take out loans for your daughter, will you take them on for your son as well? </p>
<p>I wouldn’t say the daughter made an unintelligent decision by choosing Pepperdine. Geez, the child is only 17. This is that character-building experience that happens in life. She’ll learn from it. If she is serious about transferring, let D explore transfer possibilities on her own, limiting the search to affordable colleges (this may leave UCLA off the list). It’s like high school senior year again but without the SATs. And given the example above, even the second school may not fit.</p>
<p>Good luck…</p>