Community College to Top University: My Transfer Success Story

If you're studying in the US or planning to, then you need to understand this one thing. The US college transfer system can literally change your life. Now, most international students don't use it. But I actually did and it helped me go from a small community college to a top university on a full ride scholarship. And what that basically means is they gave me all the money I needed in order to study at their school. Now, I'm going to go through all of that in this video so that you can understand exactly what transferring looks like and what it does for you. [Music] Now, I actually am William. I came from South Africa to America in 2013 as an international student and I actually started out at a community college before transferring to the University of Rochester on a full ride scholarship and even later on I actually attended the Ivy League for graduate school. Now in this video I'm going to break all of this down so that you can understand exactly what transferring looks like, what it is, and how it can benefit you. So let's get started. So in the US you don't have to stay at the same college for 4 years. And this is because you can actually transfer between schools. And what that means is that a student can start at one school and then they can transfer to another school. Meaning that they can go to a school, take classes over there, and then look around and say, "Hey, maybe this school's not for me." instead of just you know sticking at that school and staying there for four years, they can actually go to another school and complete their remaining amount of years there. So how this usually works is that a student will transfer from one school to the next and they will usually carry over their credits. And by credits what I mean is they'll carry over the courses that they've done from this school to the other school. And most of the time it's a very smooth process. But again, you have to be very careful with your move because some schools will not accept the credits from other schools. So you just have to be careful about it and you have to be strategic about how that all works. But basically what I did is actually I used this right. So I started out at a community college because it was very cheap and then I did two years there at that community college and then from there I took my associates degree and then I transferred to a 4year university. Now again, I made a video about the differences between community college and universities and colleges, and I'll put it somewhere up here. So, I did two years at the community college, got an associates degree, and then I transferred on to a 4-year school and got my bachelor's degree after 2 years there. So, in total, I spent four years to get my bachelor's degree. Very similar to what other people did, but in doing it this way, I saved over $100,000. Now again definitely watch the video that I put up here so that you can see exactly how that works. Now the thing about transferring is you can transfer from a college to a college, a university to a university, a community college to a college, a community college to a university. You can transfer across the board and it's a very powerful tool for you to use especially if you want to save money. Now the thing about transferring is many people have their different reasons for transferring. My one was money. other people's one might be because they just don't like one school. Now, transferring works because you are still able to attend amazing schools after you transfer. Even though you start out at a less competitive school, you can still transfer to a very competitive school. You can still transfer to a Harvard, a UPEN, all of those type of things. So, it's not like you're diminishing your chances of attending those great schools by transferring. So the other thing is you can save a lot of money by transferring and then you can also still graduate from top schools because honestly nobody really asks you where you started. They just care about where you graduated. So most people actually pay $60 to $80,000 per year going for four years straight to a university. But if you're smart and you start out at like a community college, you can be paying like $10,000 per year and then later on transfer to a top university. And oftent times you'll be getting access to a bunch of scholarships because universities really compete for quality transfer students. Now as an international student this makes the US educational system way more accessible because you've got these options in order to study. So now you know what is to transfer. Let's actually look at the how. Right? Step one is you're going to start strong at your first school. Now, whether you're at a community college or a university, you have to take it seriously because your grades, which is also known as your GPA, and your extracurricular activities, they matter. All right? And even your relationship with professors, they matter because you're going to need all of those when you are applying to transfer to another school. Step two is to actually plan early. So, you need to start looking at potential transfer schools after your first year. in particular, you have to check their requirements because these schools are going to have stuff such as a minimum GPA requirement. They're also going to be having other type of requirements and they're also going to be having credit transfer rules and and application rules and all of those type of things. Now, step three, now this is only if you go to a community college, but join FTHEA Kapper. at community college. If you join FTHEA Kapper, it is a national honor society and being a member will unlock you to a bunch of transfer scholarships. Now, I use this to get a full ride to the University of Rochester. So, definitely take a look at it. I've made a video for it and I'll put it somewhere up here so that you can watch it. Now, step four. Once you found the school that you want to apply to, applying to the school is very similar to how you applied to your first school. Basically, it's going to be a new application that you send and you'll have to send them your transcripts. So, basically, all the grades that you got at your current school. You're going to send them a personal essay. You're also going to send them proof of finances and also most likely letters of recommendation, etc. Now, this is why you have to prepare because you're going to need all of that by the time you apply. Now, step five, transfer your credits and enroll. So, if you're accepted, your new school will evaluate your existing credits and tell you how many will count towards your degree. Once they're doing that evaluation, you can actually be in close contact with them to ensure that you get most of the credits and then you can transfer and start at that new school. So, transferring is definitely a good thing to do because you can still complete your degree but just at a different school. So, there are a lot of myths about transferring such as, you know, transfer students don't get scholarships. This is not true at all. In fact, I got a bunch of scholarships thanks to being a FTHEA Kappa member and transferring from a community college. Another myth is something along the lines of top schools only accept firstear students. Again, that is false. You know, schools like NYU, UCLA, USC, many, many Ivy League schools accept transfer students every year. I think there was only one Ivy League school that didn't. The rest accepted transfer students. Next myth is transferring wastes time. Again, this is false. If you plan ahead and you check transfer policies, you can graduate on time or even earlier. Again, I had no problem whatsoever transferring and I finished just on time. Now, my final thoughts on all of this is the US transfer system is a powerful tool for you to use and not many international students are using it. What I want you to do is actually look at it and explore it because at the end of the day if you do not have the finances like me basically then starting off for instance at a community college makes sense and starting off there and then later on transferring to your dream school it's totally possible. So understanding this whole transfer system will definitely help you plan and I actually encourage you to read up more about transferring because it absolutely helped me out and I think it can help you out too. Having said that, thank you so much for watching. If you like this video, definitely like and subscribe. And also let me know if you're thinking about transferring, right? Is it a strategy that you would love to use? What are the pros and cons? Definitely put it all down there in the comments and I'll try and get to every single comment that's out there. But again, thank you so much for watching and I'll be seeing you in the next video.