Where to transfer after Community College Success?

College Search & Lists
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Currently attending a CC in Michigan. Have a 3.95 with 60-some odd credits. About 55 will end up transferring wherever I go. Was comparatively average in high school (about a 3.1 GPA with a 28 ACT), but I graduated in 2013, so I know they’ll mostly be looking at college.

I’m extremely busy, working 31 hours as a regular route school bus driver (youngest working there by ~20 years), and interning 14 hours/week at a residential rehabilitation facility for juvenile delinquents. I also volunteer on the Board of Directors of a local youth baseball league, running and overseeing the umpire’s program since 2013. I took 21 CH’s in fall, will be taking 22 in winter. Of those, 11 and 12 will transfer (respectively), due to 10 of each being within a social work program that probably won’t transfer, but is relatively difficult. I’m a member of Phi Theta Kappa, have cool travel experiences from the last couple summers (that also led to two explained gap semesters), and consider myself a pretty decent essay writer. My two rec’s will both be great.

I have an EFC of 0, and am looking for some sort of biopsychology or neuroscience major. I may enter a pre med curiculuum but haven’t sold myself either way yet.

UMich Ann Arbor is my #1 without a doubt, but I am open to alternative options. Their Biopsych/Cognition/Neuroscience degree is the heart eyes emoji to me (sorry). They rejected me as a freshman (which I expected) and rejected me as a transfer for fall 2016 (which I thought I was borderline). I revised my transfer app for summer 2017 with these fall grades added (4.0 in 21 credit hours - 5 classes), and I feel like with the interest I have shown being in-state I should be accepted.

I’ve also applied to Michigan State as a safety school, and may apply to Wayne State as a super safety school.

I’ve applied to Brown, Cornell, and NYU as a couple “you’ll never know unless you try” schools.

Does the CC community have any other suggestions for schools to apply to? I’m pretty dang proud of what I’ve accomplished at my community college. I was always average at school, but I’ve taken the bull by the horns at my CC and ran with it, and gotten some awesome results.

I’ve got four or five spots (depending on whether I apply to Wayne) left on my FAFSA. Should I look at some less than Ivy level out of states? Any stellar biopsych or neuroscience programs slip past my radar? Or should I just shoot for the moon and apply to Harvard, Stanford, Columbia, and UPenn? Should I apply to Wayne State as a super safety or am I good with Michigan State?

Not looking for the meaning of life, just advice.

Thank you in advance!

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Bump

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Your EFC may be zero but that doesn’t necessarily mean schools will meet full need, especially for transfer students. Are you/your family able to afford expensive private schools? Other people on this forum will eventually comment and tell you to run NPCs for every college on your list.

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@philbegas Agreed. I have run EFCs on most if not all. Most thus far are pretty solid with the exception of NYU, that would cost roughly $20k that would need student loans

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Unless you’re guaranteed admission to Michigan State then it would be good to apply to another affordable safety just in case.

Are you happy with Wayne State as a back-up? Or do you want to have other back-up options? With your high GPA some schools will offer you guaranteed merit scholarships.

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@philbegas TBH, I wouldn’t be happy going to Wayne, simply because I think I should go to a more prestigious university, but I like the idea of my super safety being guaranteed merit.

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And I would be surprised if you didn’t get into Michigan State your stats and ECs are pretty awesome.

If you have spots 5 spots and I were you, I would apply to:
2 more reaches, 2 more matches, and 1 more affordable safety.

Whether that safety is Wayne State or another school is up to you. Just don’t forget that a school’s selectivity for freshman admission is not necessarily reflective of its selectivity for transfer admissions. Transfer acceptance rates can be found in a school’s common data set

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“I’ve applied to Brown, Cornell, and NYU as a couple “you’ll never know unless you try” schools.”

You should be competitive at any elite school that guarantees to meet full need (aka not NYU). It is perfectly reasonable for you to shoot for the moon. I’d also be thinking about the top Midwestern schools like Chicago, Northwestern, and Wash U.

Wayne seems unnecessary to me. I can’t believe MSU wouldn’t take you.

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No, don’t keep adding Ivy-type schools. Stick to schools that are admissions likelies. You’re looking for choices, not rejection letters. Don’t even do NYU. When an NPC says you’ll need to borrow 20K per year, believe it and stay away.

On the Big Future college board website, search on your possible majors plus meets 80% or more of need and go from there. One thing that isn’t always clear on college search websites is the transfer admissions rate. Be sure to look that up on the common data set as you pick your colleges.

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Thank you all for your help!

My sister also attends Michigan State right now. Not to be too pretentious but I too can’t see MSU not accepting me. They have a ~70% acceptance rate.

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@mjr2013 Did you look at the Common data set for Michigan State? Their transfer acceptance rate is NOT 70%

Their transfer acceptance rate is closer to 41% They admitted 2184/5296 applicants last time around.

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@philbegas thank you for that correction. I was looking at freshmen I believe.

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@AroundHere Unless I’m missing it, it doesn’t seem like the collegeboard search has an option for transfer admissions, therefore some of the information you get for freshman admissions might not be accurate with respect to transfer aid.

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Michigan State looks like a great option. I would also ask the CC what four year college they are associated with. It is a common path in many states to do your first two years at a CC and then transfer into a four year state school almost automatically if you have the grades. It appears you do.

You are the success story. Hopefully you can show others your path to allow them to do just like you did. So many kids go directly into the four year program and get stuck with debt. CC is a great option to safe money.

Good luck.

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@MassDaD68 Absolutely! I hated the idea of going to CC my senior year of high school. Now looking at my classmates from senior year, very happy with my decision.

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“No, don’t keep adding Ivy-type schools. Stick to schools that are admissions likelies. You’re looking for choices, not rejection letters.”

I have worked with many community college and other transfers for almost twenty years. I was involved with orientation for transfers at Harvard for 5 years. This is what admitted transfers at Ivies/Stanford look like. I will be shocked if Michigan doesn’t take him, and knocked-to-the-floor flabbergasted if Michigan State doesn’t, so there’s no question about having terrific, affordable choices. If the recs and essays are as good as the OP thinks, I think Cornell and Penn are quite likely, too. Why the heck shouldn’t a highly qualified transfer try for Stanford, etc., if they want to? I think the OP doesn’t need to waste time with schools that don’t meet 100% of need. In addition to the Midwestern schools I mentioned, Hopkins, Duke, and Vanderbilt are also generous and have great programs in the OP’s field.

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Smart, community college as of now saves you money and time to apply to other schools. If you didn’t meet the criteria of your reach college in high school, you now gave yourself a second chance to meet the criteria. Truly genius!

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@Hanna Thank you! I appreciate your words and it was very helpful. :slight_smile:

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@Hanna No argument that OP is highly qualified. I just question doing more than a couple Ivy schools because not only do the accepted Ivy kids have fabulous qualifications, the rejected ones do, too.

Vanderbilt is a great suggestion - its wealthy enough to give great aid, but just that slightly lower prestige greatly improves OPs chances of admission.

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“not only do the accepted Ivy kids have fabulous qualifications, the rejected ones do, too.”

Eh, there really aren’t that many transfer applicants with this sort of profile. Transfer applicant pools don’t look anything like freshman pools, with their thousands of 4.0s. The overwhelming majority of 3.9+ college students stay at their first college or go directly from their CCs to the in-state universities that articulate with those CCs.

Harvard and Yale each take only about 10 transfers every year, so most students who look like the OP don’t get in. That’s not true of Penn (takes 200 per year), Cornell (650 per year), Brown (100-200), etc. Penn has twice the undergrad population of Yale but 20 times as many transfer spots. They aren’t rejecting lots of perfect-looking applicants the way they do with freshmen. So while I’d never call them safeties, these aren’t shoot-for-the-moon choices for the OP.