Interesting transfer situation - opinions?

giantsfan56
Thu, 07 May 2009 22:39:01 +0000

I’m currently about to complete my first semester at my local Community College and am trying to plan for a transfer. Of the schools that I had ultimately planned to apply to (Upenn, Villanova, Drexel, and Temple), I feel that Villanova is the best choice for me in terms of academics and probability of getting accepted. I intend on majoring in Finance which makes Upenn the best academic choice, but coming from a Community College I feel that the chance of getting accepted is next to nothing.

So given this, I decided to try to best align my courses with that of Villanova’s curriculum. However upon reviewing their business curriculum, their program consists of some specialized classes that really don’t have equivalents at my Community College. This now places me in a situation where I’m not sure what to do. Since Villanova only accepts fall transfers into their business school, do I…

A) Apply to Villanova for the Fall 09 Semester (their deadline is June 1). I’ll have a 4.0 from my one semester but I worry that, given it’s only one college semester, that my HS record will factor too heavily into the decision. While I was a great student in HS, ultimately extenuating circumstances (medical) caused a sharp decrease in grades around my junior year and ultimately lead to my withdrawal. As a result I went from being a top 5 student in my grade to receiving a GED. My EC’s aren’t too great either; I played two sports, participated in an environmental science competition, and I currently work 20-30 hours a week at a catholic organization (which I guess will help because Villanova is a catholic institution).

B) Use my best judgment to try to pick the most similar courses possible and hope for the best. There are some courses I can complete by Fall 2010 that are outlined in Villanova’s curriculum like Macro and Micro economics, intermediate accounting, calc 1 and 2, and a few others like social/natural sciences.

I guess that my biggest fear is that if I wait until 2010, many of my credits will be worthless and I’ll end up having to spend another semester or two (or three) in order to complete my bachelor’s. Has anybody been in a similar situation or have any input that they could offer?