I need to transfer to UVA after my freshman year.

Colleges & Universities University of Virginia
1

<p>I’m a resident of Virginia. I was waitlisted for admission to UVA for Fall 2006 and then rejected. I will be a freshman at the University of Florida this fall instead. However, before I even start school in Florida, my parents are already pressuring me about trying to transfer to UVA after my freshman year. Their main reasons are tuition costs, the fact that the majority of my family went there and “prestigiousness.” I got a tuition break at UF, which is why I’m going there (and, well, it’s Florida), but my parents have changed their mind since they decided to let me go and aren’t happy with my choice. So, this winter I plan to apply to transfer (for fall, not spring!) to UVA. I realize that UVA generally wants you to have attended two years at a college before transferring, but my parents are pressuring me now… I have to try. </p>

<p>Here is some information about myself:</p>

<p>*I ended high school with a 3.7 GPA, unweighted.
*I got an 800 on the verbal section of the SAT, 640 on the math section and 710 on the writing section.
*I satisfied my foreign language requirement at UF by doing well on the Spanish SAT II and getting IB credit for IBH spanish. If I’m going to take a language, I’d want to take a new one… Beginning languages at UF are all five credits, so I’m not able to fit one in this year.
*I have no AP credit because my school has IB. I have a little IB credit.
*As I stated previously, I’m a Virginia resident and a lot of my family went to UVA.
*I’m a Political Science major at UF (pre-law). The classes I’m taking my first semester will be:
-Honors Comparative Politics
-American History to 1877
-Introduction to Argument and Persuasion
-Introduction to Journalism
-Precalculus (More on this later.)
-Macroeconomics
(17 credits)</p>

<p>The classes I want to take second semester are:
-Calculus I
-Biology I or Chemistry I
-American Federal Government
-American History since 1877
-Some honors English elective.
(17 credits)</p>

<p>*I’m already a member of the Student Honors Organization. I intend to join several political and humanitarian clubs.
*I’m going to either participate in community service or try to get a job at one of the many Gainesville papers.
*I think I will do better in college than I did in high school. My high school GPA was flawless until my senior year. A family member died and I simply lost motivation.
*I’m taking Precalculus this semester because I didn’t score high enough on UF’s Calculus Readiness Test to get into the harder Calculus class. I took Precalculus in high school, but the Calculus Readiness Test had a lot of trigonometry on it. My high school teacher didn’t teach a lot of it (she’s actually not allowed to teach math anymore at my school because of this, ha!). My score on the Calculus Readiness Test was good enough to get into Survey of Calculus, which is essentially a less intensive class for students not majoring in anything science/math/engineering (etc) related. </p>

<p>My questions are:</p>

<p>*Is my schedule good enough to transfer to UVA? Will they think that I’m challenging myself? I have a feeling that was why I didn’t get in this year. I didn’t do the IB diploma. If my schedule needs to be more challenging, what else should I consider taking?
*Which would look better, community service or a steady job working as a copyeditor? I could use the extra cash the job would provide.
*Instead of taking Precalculus this semester and Calculus I next semester, should I take Survey of Calculus (the easier one for liberal arts students) and Statistics next semester? I’d rather spend more time studying subjects I’m interested in, so I’d like to take Survey of Calculus and Statistics.
*What kind of grades will UVA accept? Their website says mainly A’s and B’s, but I have a feeling that they probably expect higher grades than that.
*I’m not particularly worried about essays, but are personal recommendations imperative? Most of my classes have 600 students.
*I am somewhat confused about transfer requirements (both official and unofficial), so any insight into these are greatly appreciated. What else does UVA usually require of students transferring after their freshman year? Is it relatively common? </p>

<p>Thanks in advance.</p>

2

<p>*Is my schedule good enough to transfer to UVA? Will they think that I’m challenging myself? I have a feeling that was why I didn’t get in this year. I didn’t do the IB diploma. If my schedule needs to be more challenging, what else should I consider taking?
(if you want to know the specs for a schedule, you should call UVa and ask em what classes you should take to prepare for the transfer. I think that would be more sound then just establishing a rigorous courses)</p>

<p>*Which would look better, community service or a steady job working as a copyeditor? I could use the extra cash the job would provide.
(not sure if these matter in Transfer, but school activties is better, while community service and job is placed on the same scale)</p>

<p>*Instead of taking Precalculus this semester and Calculus I next semester, should I take Survey of Calculus (the easier one for liberal arts students) and Statistics next semester? I’d rather spend more time studying subjects I’m interested in, so I’d like to take Survey of Calculus and Statistics.
(see first/last question reply)</p>

<p>*What kind of grades will UVA accept? Their website says mainly A’s and B’s, but I have a feeling that they probably expect higher grades than that.
(i would think a 3.6GPA in College is sufficient, giving that 3.7 is like the 10% of the class, from what I heard)</p>

<p>*I’m not particularly worried about essays, but are personal recommendations imperative? Most of my classes have 600 students.
(they are not imperative, and in fact, not required. If you have some, it might just help. not sure, but this thread, someone asked the same question, and DeanJ might just answer it there. <a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showthread.php?t=217432[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showthread.php?t=217432&lt;/a&gt;)</p>

<p>*I am somewhat confused about transfer requirements (both official and unofficial), so any insight into these are greatly appreciated. What else does UVA usually require of students transferring after their freshman year? Is it relatively common?
(once again, for the best answers, rather then just relying on ccers, call UVA: Admission yourself)</p>

3

<p>Thanks for the answers so far. I realize that these questions are pretty specific, I just figured it was worth a shot to ask before trying UVA itself. Since I haven’t even technically started college yet, I don’t know much about it at all, let alone much about transferring.</p>

4

<p>dfkjf, since you haven’t started college yet, you should go to UF and do as well as you can there. Personally, I would always go to a school that I could see myself getting a degree from (with the exception of bottom safeties of course). </p>

<p>Do you want to go to UVA because you want to, or because your parents want to? That is a question that you have ask yourself again before even applying to UVA. Also, is UF your first choice personally? It is still a great school in and of itself. </p>

<p>As with a potential college GPA, don’t blindly assume that you’re getting a 3.7 or better in college. From friends that I have who transferred from other 4 year colleges to W&M (where I graduated), they had GPA’s between 3.2 to 3.4. Most transfers to W&M (prob UVA too) are from community college and they are the ones who have to have the sky high GPA’s. I’d say that your essay will be what will get the admissions committee to take you, because it will probably be on why you want to transfer to UVA.</p>

<p>Your schedule looks challenging enough to be UVA worthy. But then again, you haven’t started school yet and changes are likely to happen once you meet professors, etc. Good luck.</p>

5

<p>dfkjf, I transfered to UVa from VT after my first year, so it is possible. Like you, I was waitlisted in HS. Your HS stats are a little better than mine, though I think I took a tougher courseload. </p>

<p>In terms of a GPA to shoot for I think a 3.5-6 should be fine. </p>

<p>When you’re picking classes, try to look for generic classes that can be transfered easily. Also, go to the UVa website and look at the College’s area requirements. These are courses in different disciplines that everyone (except echols) must take to graduate, I found that it was beneficial to try to fulfill as many of those as possible. </p>

<p>And I think you ought to take the Survey of Calculus class. If you’re a poli sci major, you won’t need any intensive calculus.</p>

6

<p>Take what interests you. Get good grades. It’ll take care of itself.</p>

7

<p>First of all, if you go to a school with a mindset of transfering to another school,
your life there would likely be so miserable. My advice is that attend UF as if you want to graduate from there, in other words, do your best to adapt to the environment and enjoy the college life as much as possible. If, after a year or so, you are not convinced that UF is right for you, only then apply for a college in VA, consider not just UVa but other schools as well if the tuition is an issue. However, there will be no guarantee that you would be happy there either. College life is very important time of your whole life just do not waste it.</p>

8

<p>I agree, I don’t think you “need” to transfer to UVA after your freshman year. If the only reason is because your parents want you to, then I think you need to talk to them about this issue. You should go wherever you think you would be happiest and do well there. I don’t think WHERE you do your undergrad is as important as HOW well you do wherever you go.</p>

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<p>Perhaps “need” was the wrong word. I’d certainly like to. UVA was the school I wanted to go to when I was first applying to college. Not because of my parents, but because I simply like the school. I’m a political science major, so of course I would love to study at UVA. I also like UF. Out of all the schools I got into that were financially feasible, I liked it the most. However, my parents are now requiring that I transfer somewhere in state after my freshman year, so this fall I will be applying to a bunch of schools in VA. I didn’t know this until after I agreed to go to Florida. Slightly messed up on their part, maybe. Money is apparently an issue now. Things could change, sure, but I’m trying to make the best of it… I asked about what I can do now so that if I need to transfer somewhere in-state, I’ll increase my chances of going somewhere that happens to be where I originally wanted to go. If not, I’ll simply go somewhere else in VA. :)</p>

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<p>I’d be careful with the math/science courses… those tend to be difficult to get an A in and as a transfer UVA only sees your fall grades… yet at the same time they want to see that you challenged yourself a lil that semester. I’d say btw, aim for a 4.0 or don’t try.</p>