Senior transfer from 4-year university to community college bachelor program

Transfer Students
1

I am in a somewhat odd place in my academic career. Currently, I am a senior at UW (University of Washington) and I am a Geography major. Unfortunately, I never wanted to be a Geography major but I was forced to choose an open major last year because I was denied from the 4 competitive majors that I actually wanted to pursue. After about a year as a Geography major at UW I can absolutely say that I hate it. Every quarter my grades get worse and I am on track to fail all of my Geography classes this quarter. Either way I would still have to take another full year of classes because I didn’t settle into a major until the end of my Junior year.

I am not even sure if I will be able to complete this program considering how unmotivated I am. Because of this I am considering transferring back to the local community college in my hometown. They offer bachelor degrees through CityU of Seattle and CityU claims to have a very generous transfer policy accepting up to 135 credits. Another issue is that the program I would want to go into is online only. I am not sure what that would be like because I have never taken any online courses. I would still have to check exactly how long this transfer program would take but I am thinking about 2 years.

Other factors: it would be cheaper per year to go with CityU because I can live at home instead of an expensive Seattle dorm but I would need to go longer so the savings would most likely be negated.

So my question is: should I stay at the more “prestigious” 4-year university, that offers in-person learning and more opportunities, but in a program I hate and hopefully finish in one extra year. OR should I attempt to transfer to an online-only program in a major that I think I would like better but take 2 years.

2

Many people transfer from a 4-year school to a community college for academic, personal, social, health reasons - and more. So that in itself isn’t unusual, and it sounds like you have a pretty good plan. My only question is – aren’t there other majors in your 4-year university you might enjoy more? If you like the school – just not your major – transferring sounds like a drastic move.

3

I would stay where you are, honestly. You only have 1+ year. Just keep your grades high, try to do extracurriculars, and finish as soon as possible. Not worth the extra time in my opinion.

4

Yes there are other majors that I would enjoy more at UW but they are all competitive admission majors that I am not able to get into

5

Would your preferred majors be available at other four year schools (WSU, WWU, EWU, etc. if you are a Washington resident) where transfer admission (including to the major) is realistic for your college GPA?

City University of Seattle is a private non-profit four year school, not a community college. It has regional accreditation (Northwest), but its business programs (most of its bachelor’s degree programs) are not accredited by AACSB (they are accredited by ACBSP, which is considered by some employers to be a lower level business accreditation; you can compare which schools’ business programs are accredited by each organization).

If you just want a degree, ESC is inexpensive for Washington residents (less than City University of Seattle) and requires only 180 quarter credit units for a BA degree (no subject requirements). So you can transfer there, take whatever courses there that interest you, and graduate with a BA degree when you reach 180 quarter credit units.