I’m currently going to a community college in CA, and I’m trying to transfer to UCLA as a political science major.
The UC booklet says I need around a 3.2. However, the transfer person at my college says I should have around a 3.8 just to have a chance because the major is impacted.
I can’t find anything in UCLA’s paperwork or website that confirms this however.
Anyways, I realize this is a longshot question, but right now I’m carrying a 3.54 GPA (plus major-related extracurriculars), and I’m worried about my chances of getting accepted for the transfer. Does anyone here have a solid answer as to what GPA I need for this transfer?
High-demand majors may require high GPAs for transfer or admission. While a hard floor GPA may be published or publicized, the actual threshhold at any particular term may well be above that floor value. In other words, it depends. If the “inside people” suggested 3.8, then it may well be around 3.8.
PoliSci and History at UCLA aren’t impacted, strictly speaking, but there is a lot of demand for those two majors. Depending on what your post-grad goal is, you may want to consider history instead, which is a little less in-demand. There is plenty of room in upper-division history coursework to take plenty of classes in other departments. The Highwayman got into the history department with a 3.5 transferable, IIRC.
If you’re completing TAP and take care of all the pre-reqs for your major, you probably stand a pretty good chace of getting accepted. Without TAP, well, I have no idea. I don’t know anyone that transferred to UCLA without it.
Sorry, I know that wasn’t factual. Email is in my profile if you need any other support about UC transferring stuff. Been there, done that, doing it again.
Well, the post grad goal is to go to law school. I’ve considered trying the history switch for transfer purposes…but history doesn’t interest me a ton. It’s something to think about though, for sure.
See, I made the mistake of not being told/finding out about TAP until it was too late to do all the stuff for it (same thing with the honors program), so that’s one strike against me already.
What I do have going for me in the poli-sci transfer is:
- 3.54 GPA.
- ASO/Judicial Council for my college.
- Hi, Opal!
- Model United Nations participation (and Mock Trials way back in high school)
- Recommendation letters coming from two professors who are both UCLA grads (Thank you, Dr. Jaffe and Prof. Vento!)
- One hell of a compelling life story.
So…do you think it’s worth the risk of possibly not getting accepted to transfer into the major I want, or should I go for the easy History transfer?
Also, if I take the history transfer, how easy is it to change my major once accepted to UCLA? I have some time to gain extra credits (I’ll have 56.5 semester units at the end of this semester, and I won’t be transferring until Fall '07 for money reasons, so I can take extra classes to cover a couple of major’s transfer reqs), so I’m not worried about the extra classes.
Even without TAP, though, your extra-curriculars look pretty strong*, and compelling life stories are always a bonus.
Transfers can’t change majors, unfortunately. You either go in to the major you were accepted in to, or you don’t go. Also, I’m not aware of any recommendation letter process for applying, though maybe you know something I don’t.
You do have the option in the application to apply to a alternate major, so maybe that’d be a way to go.
Be aware though that everyone and their brother transfers to the UCLA polisci department with an eye towards going to law school (I can think of 3 people in my AVC class, all TAP grads, that did the exact thing), so there’s lots of competition, and anything you say in your personal statement about that is going to be old hat for the reviewing commitee. So that is something to think about as well.
In IMHO territory, I’d say go with the history. Your polisci background would serve you pretty well there, and like I said, there’s plenty of room to take other classes (The Highwayman took a few Classics courses, a few science classes, and a few polisci on top of his history load).
*IANACounselor, just been really immersed in this whole process for going on 4 years.