Second bachelors in totally unrelated field transfer impact

Transfer Students
1

Hello,

I know there is quite a bi of discussion of the financial sense behind getting a second undergraduate degree. However, I already went back due to the fact that my first bachelor’s degree was totally unrelated to my area of interest and my own financial situation. Very few of the credits applied. Please let me know if you have any experience with this sort of transfer and the impact it would have.

First degree:
Humanities degree.
3.4X

Second degree (so-far):
Engineering degree.
4.0

Neither of the schools I have attended is particularly prestigious. I am not a military veteran, but rather went to work using my first degree after graduation. My current college extracurriculars are probably middling; nothing to write home about.

I’ve come to the conclusion that I want to transfer out of my current institution for a variety of reasons. How will these GPAs impact my admission chances? Will it be an extremely negative impact?

2

Is your current university ABET accredited? Can you tell us which school it is?

Did you complete your degree (in a humanities field) at your first school?

How many semesters (or quarters) have you completed at your current school?

3

Thanks for answering.

It is ABET accredited, but I would rather not say which school in particular. It’s a school with a very high acceptance rate where I could directly enroll in the major I intended.

Yes, I completed the first degree. I am well aware of the pitfalls and limitations this causes. I definitely weighed those when making my initial decision to return to school.

I have completed two semesters at my current school, including all of the prerequisite classes that would be needed for direct admission into a lot of schools’ engineering programs. Luckily it seems like almost every class I have taken has direct equivalencies at the schools I have looked at which post equivalency charts online.

I am not necessarily shooting for only the most prestigious schools, but wondering what the impact would be. I expect there will be an impact of some sort.

4

Main effect is that not all schools admit second bachelor’s degree students, or admit very limited numbers of them.

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5

Yep. I am well aware of that bit. I should clarify that I am more wondering what the impact would be on transfer to those schools that do allow it or at least have some sort of post-bacc program. As I result of this I would need to apply to transfer to many OOS publics as well, which I know will also have an impact.

6

Why OOS publics? These will be costly.

7

In-state options for me are very limited for second bachelors engineering students. They are still cheaper than private schools without scholarship, which I can do it financially without going into too much of a loan hole.

8

I still don’t fully understand why you don’t just get your engineering degree where you are now. It’s an ABET accredited program.

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9

What state*, what specific kind of engineering, and why do you want to attend a different school?

*If you are a resident of a state in the WICHE / WUE region, you may have options at 1.5 times in-state tuition in some schools in various other states in the WICHE / WUE region.

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10

I am definitely considering that, but I am trying take in as much information as I can. I don’t love attending my current school and lean towards transferring as a result of that, even if I am doing well and have now made it through almost all of the classes often described as “weed-out”.

11

I am in that region. Thanks for posting that.

12

Utah and New Mexico also have good pathways to establish residency for tuition purposes after your first year. Maybe some of the other WICHE/WUE states do as well – not sure.

Due to some unique aspects of the LDS population, Utah has a lot of non-traditional students, so they’re used to supporting that group.

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13

Transferring while getting a second bachelor’s degree is rare enough that many (or most) of us probably do not have any direct experience with your situation. I certainly do not have experience with this. As such I am guessing.

However, to me it looks like you are most likely in a reasonably strong position as long as you can afford to finish your second bachelor’s degree, and as long as you want to do it. “Determination” may be as important of a skill as any that you might possess right now.

Your 3.4 GPA in your first degree is not all that bad, and how you did in the past in a humanities program does not say much if anything about how you are likely to do now and next year in an engineering program. Having a full year of a 4.0 in an ABET accredited engineering program is a good start, and suggests that you can handle the academics. Being from a WICHE/WUE state might give you some affordable out of state options to consider. All of this is positive.

If you do not succeed in transferring then you can still complete your ABET accredited engineering degree where you are.

I do not see any harm in applying as a transfer student and seeing how it goes. I do not think that professors that you ask for a reference are going to take this personally. If they are good professors then they will want what is best for you (which is something that they might want to discuss).

In terms of engineering degrees, “prestige” really does not matter. Graduating from an accredited program does matter. Handling the course work does matter. Getting some internship experience can also be a plus if you can do it.

I do not think that extracurricular activities are going to matter at all at this point. If you have any experience in an engineering related work that might help, but I do not think that it is essential.

If you want to transfer to MIT or Stanford or UC Berkeley that is most likely just not going to happen. However, if you want to transfer then I think that it is worth applying to a few engineering programs and see what happens. You will want to keep your budget in mind, which might (or might not) suggest that considering WUE programs is a good idea.

Let is know if you are successful. However, if you succeed in transferring to a school that you like better then I do understand that you might want to keep the names of both your old school and your new school private. Your situation is unique enough that naming either school might tend to defeat the “confidential” part of this web site’s name.

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14

Could you apply for a masters in engineering? Because your first degree was not in engineering, you’ll need to take a lot of pre-reqs anyway (that you are taking now) but it is unlikely you’d have to take any of the general courses for the ABET school (IIRC, there are about 15 credits required that you may have already taken, like English comp, another English class, a class like World History…)

I’m not sure it would be faster, but you’d have a masters in the end.

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15

However, to me it looks like you are most likely in a reasonably strong position as long as you can afford to finish your second bachelor’s degree, and as long as you want to do it. “Determination” may be as important of a skill as any that you might possess right now.

I decided to return to school out of a passion for what I am studying, not for money. Hopefully I do not lose that passion.

If you want to transfer to MIT or Stanford or UC Berkeley that is most likely just not going to happen. However, if you want to transfer then I think that it is worth applying to a few engineering programs and see what happens.

Might as well shoot my shots where it isn’t explicitly forbidden, I suppose, but I was not expecting those schools to be options anyhow. Thanks for the advice.

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16

It made very little difference in terms of required classes for me. I looked into that previously. It also seems like some employers care about holding an ABET-accredited bachelor’s. It honestly wouldn’t make much of a difference in terms of cost and I wouldn’t have a relevant undergrad degree to show for it. The way I see it, I get an undergrad degree and a much higher chance of landing the graduate program of my choice after the fact if I decide to go that route.

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17

New Mexico and Utah both have a stipulation that if you are on any kind of waiver (like WUE), that time–probably the first year–doesn’t go toward establishing residency. So students would need to pay full non-resident tuition for the first year, then seek residency the second year. (Maybe you knew that but just wanted to point it out.)

University of New Mexico does give qualified non-residents a full waiver for up to four years, so it’s like (sorta) being a resident for tuition purposes. Other WUE states largely seem to give 150% of resident tuition in their waivers.

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18

Agree with the advice to discuss your plan with your professors.

They may have suggestions of “workarounds” to make your current program more exciting/worth sticking with. They may have contacts in industry (many do) which will help you with a job down the line. They may have extra funding right now for a research spot on one of their teams and even without looking- boom- you’ll get some terrific experience regardless of where/what you end up doing.

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