Where do college transfer students go after they earn their two-year associate’s degree?
It’s been a tough question to answer when you consider that colleges and universities have traditionally been focused on high school seniors. The transfer student who graduates from a community college has legitimately felt overlooked. But that reality could be changing for a couple of reasons.
Reason No. 1:
Four-year colleges and universities are courting community college transfer students much more aggressively than in the past. Highly selective schools such as University of Southern California and New York University have revved up their community college recruiting to help with their diversity numbers.
Reason No. 2:
With the economy stuck in the doldrums, private colleges lower on the academic food chain are also searching for transfer students to fill their slots. These schools need more students at a time when then numbers of families who can pay for college has dwindled.
Private colleges “really need to bring in fresh students who’ll be able to pay for four years,” says Tatiana Melguizo, an education professor at USC, who was quoted in an USA Today story. “But, if they can get transfers, who get financial aid from the government and other sources, they can at least get two years.
For community college transfer students wondering what their next step is, Phi Theta Kappa, the community college honor society, is beta testing a new online resource tool at CollegeFish.org. The new tool will help match up transfer students with four-year colleges that could be good fits.
Lynn O’Shaughnessy is the author of The College Solution, an Amazon bestseller, and she also writes a college blog for CBSMoneyWatch.
I was a California community college student and I must say this is extremely true. I was accepted to the University of Denver, a school I never would have been accepted to out of high school. Far too many of my friends went to 4 year universities out of high school and 10 out of the 12 ended up going back to a community college within 3 years of graduation.
I’m graduating from UCSB this year, and I really wish I had gone to a community college for the first two years and then transferred to a four-year university. I’ve seen my tuition go up a ridiculous amount over the past four years, much more than my parents or I had even anticipated.
I found this blog post that details all the advantages of going to community college. I found it really helpful for my little brother who’s graduating from high school soon, so hopefully you can too!
http://blog.greensherpa.com/index.php/student-life/the-frugal-student-part-9-community-college-perks/
Attending a community college can be an excellent resource for students, but you have to be sure that you graduate from the community college. Many students never do. I’ve written a lot about college transfer students and community college on my blog.
Here is the link:
http://thecollegesolutionblog.com/category/college/community-colleges/
Lynn O’Shaughnessy