I am already getting accepted to universities, but I have no idea what I want. It comes down to the lifestyle when deciding if I want to stay or go away. If I stay I can finish school faster, save money for medical school, retake a class I didn’t do so well in that I took through dual enrollment, and stay active in current activities. If I go away I will probably have debt due to housing, I won’t finish school as fast as I would like due to me visiting home, my GPA will be slightly affected due to that class I won’t be able to retake, and when it comes to medical school I want to get the highest GPA I can get, but I’ll be getting a college experience by being in a new environment, meeting new people, and having some time away from my family. What do you think?
- How much faster would you complete college while at home?
- Why can’t you retake that dual enrollment class at sleepaway college?
- If you’re so set on medical school, why do your summer plans apparently involve taking extra classes and NOT research opportunities?
I do like the idea of research opportunities during the summer, but the problem with my dual enrollment class is that it’s not offered at the school I would want to go to if I go away and I’ve taken other classes through dual enrollment and none of them would transfer.
It is only August. Most people have not started applying to college yet.
Do you want to go away? How do you know that the courses wouldn’t transfer? Are there other school where they would?
In most cases, letter grades don’t transfer from one college to another. You will have two separate GPAs, one from each college, and you’ll need to report both of them every time you apply for something. Retaking the class at another school will not erase the grade from the first school (although it will show that you’ve improved).
@bopper
Good observation!
In Texas, some state universities start admitting almost as soon as the rolling admissions window opens (August 1st). Perhaps a few schools in Florida (where OP is) also follow the same admissions style.
I wouldn’t make your decision hinge on whether or not you can retake a single class. If you keep your other grades up, that one grade that is lower than you like shouldn’t tank you too hard.
How much faster are you talking about finishing? As someone else already mentioned, successful med school applicants do a lot of other things with their breaks - shadowing doctors, doing medical research, clinical volunteering, summer pre-med/health programs, etc. If you are doing the things that you need to be doing to be competitive for med school, staying home vs. going away may not affect how quickly you finish as much as you think it will.
How much debt are we talking? There’s a difference between taking on a small amount of debt to go to a school you really like vs. taking on unsustainable debt. Anything more than $40,000 is probably too much debt (total), but even less than that might not be a smart idea if you have a great local university you’re happy with that costs a lot less. It kind of also depends on the colleges you are comparing.
You’ll meet new people and be in a new environment regardless of which school you go to. 20 minutes vs. 20 hours a way doesn’t change that. The difference is simply that you’ll be a commute away. The biggest difference here is that it sounds like you’ll be commuting from home at the close school, whereas you’d stay on campus at the faraway school, but you could do stuff like arrange to live on campus the first year and then move home for years 2-4 at the close by school.