<p>If you do reasonably well but don’t like the atmosphere, your chances of transferring to a peer institution are strong. If you were good enough to get into X as a high school student, doing academically well at Caltech for a few terms boosts your stock enough that you would be competitive for X even in the harder transfer pool.</p>
<p>I know of one example relevant to your situation: a girl I know didn’t enjoy the academic boot camp freshman year, and her grades were mixed – probably about half A’s and B’s, with one or two C’s. She told me she applied to Stanford as a transfer and got in, but decided to stay here at Caltech.</p>
<p>One more thing: I’m on UASH, the committee that deals with people who have academic problems. The overwhelming reason that people’s grades fall below a B average is serious personal troubles or huge conflicting time commitments that leave little time for schoolwork. While not everyone who tries hard can get straight A’s, most people who try hard CAN get a 3.0 or so. (By the way, this was decidedly not true in NQO’s time. You can see, Caltech is getting a little soft. If we weren’t, none of you cautious children would come! 
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