Help an indecisive NJ girl choose where to go for college

College Search & Lists
, ,
1

i was fortunate enough to hv received the transfer option from cornell for animal science, which remains my dream as i hope to pursue vet school (or possibly dental school) in the future!

this means as long as i get b’s or above in my core stem courses and maintain a minimum 3.0 GPA, i’m pretty much guaranteed admission to cornell come sophomore year.

SO… now i just need help choosing what school to go for my first year! below r some of my options:

  • unc chapel hill
  • northeastern (nu in program)
  • colby
  • rutgers new brunswick honors college
  • rutgers camden honors college
  • uc berkeley
  • colgate
  • wellesley
  • wesleyan
  • colorado college
  • carleton college
  • smith college
  • uc irvine
  • kenyon
  • uc davis
  • uconn
  • rutgers newark

my parents rly want me to go to uc berkeley (where i’ll be an ecosystem management and forestry major at the rausser college) bc it’s technically the “best” school i got accepted into, but i’m just terrified i might lose my “guaranteed” transfer due to berkeley’s grade deflation and notoriously difficult stem courses.

PLS HELP!!!

2

My daughter also got TO, we’ve been advised that if she wants to do it (human ecology requires 3.5 and B+ in classes) that she should go to the easiest school from her admit list, our state flagship, and do really well and it makes the transfer easier.

8 Likes
3

First off, for the types of careers you are talking about, the name probably won’t matter. Costs will though - because college is expensive and then medical school is really expensive.

But to answer your question, I would go to the school that you would love to be at four years. Why? Because you should love your college experience - and hopefully you will so much, that you might even forget about Cornell (or you might not, but it would be nice to have that option)…

There’s not a school on your list where you cannot achieve your goals.

That said, you have such a variety of schools - small LACs, one that takes one class at a time, and large schools.

Where would you want to spend four years - and that you can afford? That’s where you should go.

Good luck to you.

3 Likes
4

You sound pretty sure that you want to be able to major in Animal Science. At any school you attend, there’s the chance that you’ll be really happy there and begin to feel that you don’t want to leave. So, in your position, I would lean toward a school where I wouldn’t have to give up my desired major in order to stay. That would mean either Rutgers, UConn, or UC Davis. Obviously Rutgers would be the least expensive of these, plus you’d be in the Honors College, so you’d have to have a strong preference for one of the others to give up those advantages… but they’re all excellent for your area of interest, and would work great whether you go through with the transfer or not. Plus, they’d give you exposure to the pre-vet animal science pathway, and hopefully help you to confirm your desire to stay on that path - or not! - before you go through with the transfer.

Edited to add: Going to Berkeley for one year strikes me as a little masochistic. Students pay a lot of metaphorical dues in that first year - living in absolutely minuscule freshman triples (seriously, the tour made me think about sticking a snorkel out the window to breathe), large lower-division lecture classes, having the lowest priority for course selection… it’s all about waiting your turn for the best that Berkeley has to offer. Which you then wouldn’t stay for. Makes no sense to me, but that’s JMHO.

11 Likes
5

If that is your real name, I strongly encourage you to change it to something more anonymous. Here are instructions how to do that.

2 Likes
6

Either choose a school that you are willing to stay at to graduation, or choose a low cost school if you are set on transferring to Cornell (does that transfer pathway allow starting at a community college?).

6 Likes
7

I am not a fan of attending a college with the intention of transferring after a year. This could prevent you from hitting the ground running with regard to making friends, getting involved, etc. I am afraid you will begin this journey without the same excitement as others.

I suggest forgetting about Cornell. You can be pre-vet or pre-dental at any school. For example, just for kicks I looked at my daughter’s school (UNC) and they have the Pre-Veterinary Society of UNC Chapel Hill, offering a bunch of resources and service projects. I am sure they have similar opportunities at most schools.

Pick a school where you can be happy for 4 years. If you feel strongly about the animal science major, go to UConn, Rutgers, or UC Davis. Forget about Cornell for now and focus on getting fully involved at the school you choose.

Also remember that veterinary and dental school are both very, very expensive. I would take that into account as well. FYI: acceptance to Rutgers HC is very impressive. Congrats!

4 Likes
8

When analyzed statistically, as in this site, Colby appears to represent the most selective school to which you were accepted: College & University Rankings. Irrespective of this, however, perhaps you would benefit from choosing your college based on whether it offers academic programs and an environment that would be desirable to you, much as you would if you were not considering a transfer option.

9

This. You have a good amount of excellent choices in your acceptances. Pick the one where you think you will stay for all four years.

4 Likes
10

Vet school is expensive. Are all the schools on your list affordable? (Oops, I now see from the thread title that you aren’t in-state in CA… in that case the CA schools will be expensive!)

I have a friend who is a professor at Davis vet school, and she says that if you want to go to vet school there, it can be advantageous to go to undergraduate school there. (Application Statistics | School of Veterinary Medicine) I’m not sure whether there’s an effect like that at other vet schools.

Agree with the other posters that you should choose a school where you’ll be happy and where you’d like to be for four years.

11

If it was me, I’d go to the Rutgers Honors College. That is a great program, Rutgers works for your possible interests, and would save money. You might well not transfer, but even if you did I think it would still be a rewarding experience and good way to start college.

Only doing the first year at a place like Cal strikes me as doing it the completely wrong way. I think it is true that these sorts of large research universities can converge toward a private/honors experience in the last couple years as you get deep in your major-only classes. But at least to me, the worst years are going to be the first years.

2 Likes
12

If you 100% plan to take advantage of the Cornell transfer I’d go to your cheapest option for the first year.

3 Likes
13

Congrats on the Cornell TO and other great acceptances. My advice would be to choose the school whose freshman courses most closely resemble those at Cornell.

3 Likes
14

Your first year you won’t be any major. You will be taking general ed requirements. You can do that anywhere.

5 Likes
15

The first 4 from your list all offer something positive and substantially different

  • UNC: a public Ivy with good weather and sports (probably the closest experience to Cornell with better weather; prepare for HARD science classes.)
  • NUin: an opportunity to live abroad and/or in a different area of the country, probably (relatively!!!) easier courses and more relaxed experience before you join the prevet grind at Cornell.
  • Colby: lots of personal attention, a great combination of intellectual challenge and support, the LAC experience which can’t be experienced at any other time, lots of resources per student
  • Rutgers honors: probably the cheapest, great dorms, all your peers will be topnotch

I’d stay away from UCB and Wellesley due to grade deflation (and people have already explained why attending Berkeley for 1 year makes no sense.)

5 Likes
16

My older daughter is currently in her third year of a DVM program. She loves it. It is very hard work and requires a very high level of dedication and determination. She reports that most of the students in her program are taking on way too much debt and do not want to talk about it.

You should expect that by the time that you get there a DVM program could cost more than $100,000 per year (unless you attend an in-state public DVM program, which I am not sure that your state even has). Veterinarians just plain do not make enough money to pay off their debt if they take most of this as debt. If you want to keep open the dream of getting a DVM, then you should try to get your bachelor’s degree with no debt, and you would be way, way better off if you can get some very significant parent help with the cost of your DVM.

Another issue is that during the welcoming ceremony 2 1/2 years ago they introduced the students in the program and said where each had gotten their bachelor’s degree. They came from a very, very wide range of undergraduate universities. It was rare to hear the same school mentioned twice.

So you can attend nearly any university and complete the requirements to apply to DVM programs. The required courses will be the same as the required premed courses. These will be very academically challenging classes. There will be some optional animal science specific classes, and the clinical experience that you will need will involve very different patients compared to the clinical experience that premed students get.

I also agree with others that transferring is not ideal.

To me this suggests four issues to consider when deciding where to go for your first year. (i) Cost. Go somewhere affordable. (ii) Comfort. Go to a school where you will be comfortable, and where you might consider staying for a full four years; (iii) Animal experience. Which schools will allow you some experience with the animals (preferably including large ones)?; (iv) GPA. Keeping your GPA up is important. You will want to keep up a “DVM program worthy” GPA (way over 3.0) for all four years, including your first year.

Please note something that I did not include on the list: Prestige. It doesn’t matter.

All of this will tend to agree with other comments that UC Berkeley does not seem like the best choice. It loses on points i, iii, and iv.

UC Davis is of course very good for animal science and has a great DVM program. I would expect that it would also lose on point i.

The University of Connecticut is quite good for animal science. I am not sure how it does with regard to cost for you.

I have heard good things about UNC.

I do not know which campuses of Rutgers would have animals.

3 Likes
17

Lots of great information! FWIW the OP plans to take advantage of a guaranteed transfer option to Cornell after one year so will likely be taking general ed requirements freshman year.

1 Like
18

!!! :100: !!! this is also what I hear from my friend who teaches at vet school. Many students do not want to talk about it (or think about it). But it is a huge burden for new veterinarians.

4 Likes
19

Since you plan to transfer to Cormell, it might make most sense to look at what you plan/need to do in your first year (gen ed?) and how that looks at each. You might also think about what kind of experience you’d like to have given that you’ll have 3 years in Ithaca. Kind of like knowing you’ll be moving to Aspen next year, so maybe you’d choose a vacation in Hawaii rather than Vail.

Colby, for example, will give you small classes for your gen ed requirements and a year at a LAC. There will be lots of support

You could sample another part of the country with others.

I’d definitely pay attention to the 101 classes - accessibility, size, etc.

Agree with others about cost, so assuming that they’re all the same as I make this suggestion.

1 Like
20

Cook campus has the farm.

1 Like