<p>Here’s the scoop…Great kid…friend of the family…not overly great stats…applied to one reach school for class of 2010…for a film division (excellent filmmaker with national awards left and right)…did NOT get accepted…did not apply anywhere else, instead opted for 1 year of cc, and will reapply for film programs (I hope more than one school)…</p>
<p>Here’s where I need your help…if you know first-hand, please share…kid has told D he’s applying as a “freshman” and is not sharing his semester at cc (nor the upcoming semester)…it is MY take that the schools will know/find out (due to the age of technology) that he’s NOT a freshman, and will not only not accept him, but may very well blacklist him…is this a realistic expectation on my part, or am I being overly concerned?</p>
<p>I really like this kid, he has a bright future ahead, his family will send him anywhere he wants to go.</p>
<p>Your take please? I intend to share every post with him.</p>
<p>They’ll find out. Most obviously, they’ll know his year of graduation from his transcript. The schools will want to know what he has been doing since graduation.</p>
<p>College applications mandate that you send official transcripts of high school work and any previous college courses taken. In these “modern” times, they will most assuredly find out and he will have a major problem.</p>
<p>Justa–why is he taking the CC courses, if he wants to start over a freshman? Why not find something to do with the remainder of the year? For the record, I understand his feelings if it’s because he wants to have the full, four-year undergrad experience. When my D transfered, she wi****lly wished for the same thing (which of course was not do-able, she’d had a full first year in a four year school, and even if transfer school had been amenable, we were not paying for the extra year.) I am not totally convinced schools will automatically find out if he doesn’t tell them, but if they somehow do, I agree his admittance might be in jeopardy for falsifying info. Why not contact the schools and see if he could enter as first time frosh after just a few CC classes, and then forego the next semester?</p>
<p>(I’m assuming this is not about a low grades issue, as he’s continuing to take the classes this upcoming semester.)</p>
<p>If he was turned down initially, wouldn’t it be easier to enter as a transfer after his freshman year? I would think the school would like his persistence and determination to get in, and would view CC classes in the interim as a positive way to spend the year.</p>
<p>No, school transcripts are definitely not “open” to others. Student must sign to have them sent anywhere.</p>
<p>But I still don’t understand why he’s taking these courses if he doesn’t want to use the credits. Surely there are other productive ways of spending this school year.</p>
<p>If he is applying for financial aid, he will need to be honest on FAFSA about his past college matriculation status. FAFSA fraud carries criminal penalties. There is a limit to the number of FTE (full-time equivalent) years a student can maintain undergraduate eligibility for Federal financial aid, so lying about previous enrollment status on FAFSA could be fraudulent and carry criminal penalties.</p>
<p>It is true that school transcripts are not automatically open to others, but once a FAFSA has been filed, the Department of Education has the right to share financial aid information with schools where the student is applying. Previous years of matriculation elsewhere are relevant to financial aid eligibility. There are aspects of Federal financial aid that apply to students depending on their year in college.</p>
<p>Students applying for financial aid who have previously matriculated at other institutions are supposed to obtain “financial aid transcripts” from all previously attended institutions, whether or not they actually received financial aid from those schools.</p>
<p>I think it is fine that the kid is applying as a freshman. It sounds like he is taking a gap year in which he is also taking some CC courses (along with practicing his film making, I assume). I am not sure why he doesn’t want to share his CC experiences/transcripts with colleges, but I’m also not sure he is obligated to.</p>
<p>Statistically, admissions chances for transfers into selective programs are often greater than for freshmen, so he may be hurting himself with that strategy. That is, you will often find that that percentage of transfer admissions at a given college are much higher than freshman applicants – so the kid really should explore that. I mean, if only 20% of freshman applicants get in, but it turns out that 40% of transfers are accepted, maybe its a lot better to go in as a transfer.</p>
<p>Some schools (I know this is true for MIT, and I presume for others) state flat-out that if you have enrolled in any other college as a degree-seeking student, you are not eligible to apply as a freshman but must apply for transfer admissions. It’s fine to have taken some courses at a community college, but if you enrolled in the college you’re considered a transfer. (And at MIT, the transfer acceptance percentage is abysmal even compared to their low freshman percentage, on the order of <5% per year (typically fewer than 10 students accepted for transfer each year).) MIT is something of a special case, I know, and may not be relevant to film schools, but those are atypical also – so perhaps there’s some parallel.</p>
<p>S is taking a gap year, and before doing so, checked with colleges to find out if he took community college courses how many he could take and still apply to their college as a freshman. From what I remember, the answer was 4. Your friend needs to check for himself.</p>
<p>Your friend would be IMO better off finding a job or volunteer work that’s somehow film related instead of going to community college. Unless he has something more in his background than he had when he applied the first time, the college will have no reason to accept him. After all, admissions are getting harder every year due to the larger numbers of college-bound students. Any college whre he applies will want to know what he did during his time off. Film schools are hard to get into, so he would be wise to find a way to either take noncollege courses in them or to work or volunteer in the film field or a related one.</p>
<p>Transcripts may not be open to others without the student’s permission, but the fact that the student is enrolled in a school is not covered by privacy laws.</p>
<p>If your friend’s S hasn’t taken film courses at the CC, he may need to take an additional year to complete the major’s requirements. And if the scholl he’s applying to does not accept his CC credits, he may have to take a full 4 years anyway, even as a freshman.</p>
<p>And of course, as noted above, he will have to explain what he did during his gap year.</p>
<p>MY DD graduated from HS at 15 and was not ready to go off to university away. Many many HS kids take community college classes through the HS programs in our area and D is taking CC classes now. In talking with admissions depts. at the schools she is considering, mostly privates, they primarily want to consider her as a freshman with units, just like AP units of HS cc class units. That being said, she will show what she has been doing, but they will consider her with her freshman cohort in terms of classification. I don’t know if that is all schools, but it makes sense to me. The one caveat was to NOT have 60 or more semester units or you must be a transfer. Your friend needs to discuss his situation with the admissions department of each school to which he is applying.</p>
<p>The status of a student depends on the number of courses the student takes.</p>
<p>If the student takes the normal courseload of a fully enrolled student, say four courses per semester, the student will be considered a fully enrolled cc student. If, however, the student takes only a few courses, the courses should be disclosed on the application and will strengthen it; but the student will not be considered a full-time cc student and thus will not need to apply as a transfer.
If the student is not interested in receiving credit for the cc courses, he could audit them (with the permission of the instructor) and would not have to disclose that fact. Or he could do so, but that would not count against him when applying as a freshman. Still, the idea of internships and gaining experience if an excellent one.</p>
<p>Your best bet would be to read the policy at what ever school your S is considering. While some are flexible and will say as long as you don’t have 1 credits you are still a freshman and other schools will count any college course taken anywhere (outside of dual programs during high school) will make you loose your freshman status and you will have to apply as a transfer</p>