This is the beginning. The beginning of questions and answers, guilt and remorse, anxiety and depression. But most of all, it’s the start of a new feature. No, it’s not the witty banter of the New Yorker or the drab criticism of the Los Angeles Times, but rather an average dude giving you guys some desperately needed insight into what makes this campus tick. Welcome to “Ted on the Street.”
Now that I’ve shamelessly plugged myself and introduced you to my weekly insanity, allow me to start this week’s topic: transferring. For those of you who started here at Cal State Long Beach, good for you. I hope paying more for less has suited you well. But don’t worry, I’m not talkin’ trash – yet. Actually, you may have done the smart thing considering the info you’re about to hear.
Let’s start with the basics. Transferring begins at your local community college, whether it’s Long Beach City College or El Camino College (two of the biggest suppliers to CSULB). From there, a student has some choices: continue wandering mindlessly through the over-crowded classrooms and the high school-like atmosphere of the community college campus without a plan of how to get out, or skip their way over to the local counseling office to learn about the next step.
The Skinny
Glenda Lee Neciosup, a CSULB alumnus and graduate student, who is also the outreach and recruitment specialist here on campus, described her transfer experience from Pasadena Community College as good but also mentioned the possibilities for horror stories.
“A lot of problems come up from not having the information,” Neciosup said. “My overall transfer experience was pretty good. I did a lot of research, went to the transfer center and talked to various people here on campus.”
The problems begin when the student does these things and prepares all he or she can but somehow still runs out of room on the runway to make a safe landing. According to Neciosup, getting your GE (general education) certification done may still lead to trouble.
“Some majors at a city college may have different requirements than the school you may want to transfer to,” Neciosup said. “Some majors have a different equivalent for a class than we have here and as a result it can cause delays for students wanting to graduate in a certain number of years.”
Besides getting an alumni’s perspective, it helped to hear from someone higher up in the land of transfers. Rosa Carrillo, assistant director for Transfer Services, gave some insight on the process as a whole and what is required for upcoming transfer students.
“The university is now making it mandatory for a $150 deposit for all students who send intent to enroll starting Spring of 2007,” Carrillo said. “We’re a very popular school and until they register for SOAR [Student Orientation, Advising and Registration] we don’t know if they’ll actually be enrolling. The money helps guarantee who will be coming. Also, we give priority to transfer students when registration begins, which is fairly new.”
The Street
Perhaps the only way to know whether what one learns from a source is accurate and valuable information is to talk to the students.
“I transferred from Harbor College when I was an undergrad,” said Rosey Montejano, a social work graduate student. “It was pretty easy to transfer from there. The counselors pointed me in the right direction and I was fine.”
Steven Sakoguchi, an English literature major, had a similar experience.
“You know, mine was pretty smooth from Cypress [College], but because I was there almost five years it made it easy for me,” he said. “When I came over here I tried to do everything on my own and I didn’t do SOAR, which hindered me a little bit, but once I got here I adjusted just fine. If I could do it over, I would have done SOAR.”
Ted Concludes
Although it’s part of the allure of being a writer to be able to bash people and programs that are flawed and make people’s lives miserable, my tongue went on vacation for this one. As a transfer student myself, I can say that although it wasn’t perfect, my experience was basically uneventful. Aside from advisers who didn’t know how to help me apply to an impacted department (film), which isn’t their job anyway, and the fact that transferring without certification was possible but cost more (which I had to learn after four years of community college at El Camino), I made it out OK.
There are only a few things you need to know that might make your day brighter. GE certification: get it done; SOAR workshop: make it happen; listening to counselors: priceless, but do your own research so you don’t get the shaft on the acceptance bit.
