I go to a school out of state, but I do not like my school or my major. My parents have suggested that I consider coming home and transferring to a UC. However, I’m not sure if it is worth the effort – my program is very narrow right now, and I had several AP classes, so I have only had to take one semester of English, and I took music theory instead of traditional math. It looks like I will have quite a few classes to take before I am eligible to transfer to most UC’s. I also don’t have many classes in my desired major considering the fact that I want to make a significant change in majors. I am also concerned about how few students transfer from non-California schools anyways. Should I even bother? I could change my major at my current school, but I paynout of state tuition.
** I also currently have 120 credits but I am going into my third/junior year.
Assuming you’re a freshman, I strongly suggest you attend a community college for a year or two (depending on which credits will transfer and how many classes are needed) because California community college students get the highest priority in transfer admissions.
If you graduated from a HS in California you may be able to transfer, but I see that the problem would be that you are going into your junior year, and you may have too many credits to transfer to the UC’s.
You need to talk to a UC advisor. If you go to a CCC, you may end up with even more credits and some UC’s won’t take Senior transfers.
http://admission.universityofcalifornia.edu/counselors/files/uc-transfer-maximum-limitation-policy-chart.pdf
Assuming those are quarter units, you can transfer 105. Then you add on any upper division units to that. Once you reach the UC unit cap, you’re ineligible.
A CCC will not add any more units than the 70 sem/105 qtr, since they are all LD. It’s the UD that is the problem. Davis and Merced - 15 qtr units of UD puts you at the max.
http://admission.universityofcalifornia.edu/counselors/files/uc-transfer-maximum-limitation-policy-chart.pdf
Also, in the heirarchly of OOS, the UCs will accept 2-year (CC) OOS before 4-yr OOS, assuming you tried straight to UC, which it doesn’t sound like you’re contemplating.
Thanks for the input.
I don’t think I want to go to community college, as it might add as many as four or five additional years to my time in school. However, it is not 100% off of the table.
The concept of transferable credits is confusing. I am currently a music student, and I want a BA in another field (business related) as opposed to a BM in performance. Most of my credits credits will not be relevant to a desired major, and I also currently have some credit from 3 scores on AP exams. I figure I would need to discuss this with a counselor.
I didn’t graduate in California, but my family lives there now. If I want to do something different, do you think the CCC --> UC route would be worth it, or should I just try to switch programs at my current school and finish in 2 - 2.5 more years?
I think i’d stay put - change majors if you want. Heading to a CC then UC will probably delay your graduation by a year or more. Also, you may not qualify for in-state tuition, which would make that extra time really expensive.
Yeah, I kind if agree. It sounds more like you should just stay put. Maybe add a minor?
Yeah, staying put makes sense. I already have a minor. I’ll have to think about what I want to do with my major.