Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Age or Ability Specific Forums College Transferring college credits

I'm just curious to see how many others have run into a lot of difficulties in transferring credits from one college to another or even AP credit from HS days.

It's been our family experience that most colleges have the standard path down pat, however, when it comes to anyone who is taking a non-traditional path, we've quickly run into a considerable amount of problems in this area, including even between state funded colleges within the same state. We even had one college tell our eldest son, "Once you start your first semester then the professors will look it over and let you know what transfers." That of course doesn't play well when you're trying to decide between numerous colleges to attend next semester.

I also know many colleges now are limiting how many credit hours of AP classes they'll accept to 6 or 9 credits. The state college our youngest son attends is looking at disallowing credits from online classes in at least some subjects.

My eldest is only now starting this process, but I worked at a community college for a little while, and I learned a few points about transfer credits.

1. Individual colleges often have web pages addressing this subject. Try a web search for [college name] "transfer credit".

2. You can ask admissions counselors. That said, it looks like you may have gone this route and aren't making much progress. Did your son tell them explicitly that he needed the information so that he could plan ahead?

3. State-school to state-school: look for a systemwide policy regarding credit transfer. At the CC where I worked (in California), all classes were classified as to whether they were eligible for CSU and/or UC credit, and what kind (e.g. Gen. Ed.; major-specific, etc.).

4. If your son has been taking classes at a community college, check with someone at the community college. The academic counselors should know about in-state transfer credit.

The thing is, many community college students who are aiming for four-year degrees are on very tight budgets and can't afford to take classes that don't qualify for transfer credit. In this state, at least, the result is that the CCs are very serious about designing courses that qualify for transfer credit at UC and CSU.

I hope that helps.

ETA: I found this link for UC transfer credits.

I found this link for New York.

I found these links by searching for [state name] transfer credit from community college.

Thanks for your input Val. Yes we've viewed pages as you've described and even at that we get responses that such information is under review and changes frequently.

Unfortunately the admissions counselor was of little help, and this was the admissions counselor in charge of transfers. This wasn't a problem at just one college, both state colleges had the same problem. It took us nearly 4 months of weekly e-mails and phone calls to get things straightened out.

Unfortunately also, our state doesn't have a system wide policy regarding credit transfer.

We've worked though all of this now, my reason for posting was mostly to give a heads up to other people who may be college students or parents of HS and current college students to start early and really be careful about what transfers when making college plans and choices.

Wow! Amazing.


Again, wow. Introductory physics and introductory chemistry just don't change that much. DS took it a year ago and it was little different from what I learned in the 80s. The basics of certain sciences are just... the same. Obviously, other stuff has changed (e.g. particle physics and biomedicine), but not, you know, the basics of redox reactions and mechanics.

Interesting that your state doesn't have a transfer policy. What do community college students do? Do they get stuck taking more classes than they should have to?

Humanities I didn't transfer from the community college here in town to the state college.

Differential Equations at one state college was 3 credits, in the other state college it was 4 credits, that took 2 months to straighten out before they'd accept it.

Physics I for Engineers / Physics studens at one state college is 4 credits, in the other it's 5 credits. It doesn't necessarily transfer.

Colleges are getting hungry for money of course, they're attempting to limit the number of credits from other sources. They're getting very picky and looking for reasons not to accept credits from other sources.

We're blessed to have a strong community college here in town, still, one needs to be very careful what they sign up for to ensure it transfers.

Thank you for bringing up this issue for discussion! DS and DD are incoming 9th graders who are taking their first courses at our local community college this summer. While we have a mostly coherent transfer policy between the CC and state universities, when you add in AP credit and CLEP credit and possible overlap among the three sources, the end results can be confusing and not completely predicable. I am still trying to figure out possible options and avoid causing issues if they end up at a private out of state college.

One of the other considerations is that there are, for instance, different Physics I classes at many colleges. Physics I, and then Physics I for Engineers / Physics Students. If one takes the normal Physics I class at a community college and then enters into an Engineering program, that normal Physics class might not transfer to the College of Engineering. I've seen math classes and Chem. classes in similar situations.

I'd just encourage everyone make absolutely no assumptions, consider each college and each class on an individual basis and do your homework.

Old Dad makes a great point.

There's also the reality that some community college classes aren't as demanding as equivalent classes at colleges and universities. Thinking about it now, my son took a couple classes at the CC last year, and they definitely didn't cover the amount of material that perhaps they might have. When asked about the slow pacing, one professor told my son that he had to move through the material very slowly in order not to lose his students.

So that's one end of the spectrum, and the problem stems directly from students who lack skills in mathematics.

The other end of the spectrum is when too much material is covered too quickly. IMO, racing from one topic to the next doesn't allow students time to ponder what they've learned. IMO, this process makes it hard to acquire an understanding of how what the topic at hand is connected to different topics in the subject itself, as well as to other subjects. (Okay, this paragraph is a bit OT)....

Another issue we've run across is assumptions on the part of course descriptions and prerequisites.

My eldest received a BS in Physics from one state university. He decided then to study Electrical Engineering at another state university. Since so many of his credits transferred from Physics to EE, he was immediately considered of Junior status in the EE program. Eldest son was interested in the focus area of power industry so he signed up for the Power course in EE, it's only prereq. was Junior status.

After the first week he met with the professor and said, "I have to say, a lot of what you've been talking about this week is going over my head. I'm concerned about being ready to take this class."

Looking over my eldest son's background the professor raised an eyebrow. "Oh, you haven't taken class X, Y, or Z yet." my son replied, "The prereqs. didn't state you needed class X, Y, or X."

The professor then stated that they assume if you're of Junior status you've already taken class X, Y, and Z.

This once again showing that when you're outside of the realm of being a traditional student, you need to take extra precautions to ensure that everything is double checked, understood, and that you consider the less obvious.

Thankfully my eldest son stuck with it and worked though it thanks to a friend mentoring him for a few weeks until he was up to speed. He ended up getting a A in that graduate level class and it led to his current summer internship, so all worked out for the best.

That is a great anecdote. I have actually seen shades of it at our local CC. The catalog will sometimes just list one pre-requisite but if you go and look up that pre-requisite, you then see other prerequisites.