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Community college is now for everyone. Or at least it is for more students than it used to be. According to an article in the Washington Post:
Increasing number of high school graduates… pass over top-drawer public and private universities to become honor students at community colleges. Recession-wary students are flocking to selective two-year programs, which allow students to complete half of their college education for about $8,000, then transfer to a more prestigious four-year institution.
Honors students are a new concept in American community colleges. Community colleges are looking to take advantage of the high cost of traditional colleges and universities by creating selective programs to prepare students who wish to transfer to elite universities.
It is not really clear what an “increasing number” means, in part because community colleges have always taken all comers, both students who are not really ready for college and students who are very ready but use community colleges because they are inexpensive and easy to access. But according to the article community college applications are up in DC-area schools.
The student profiled in the piece, Kira Cassels of Laurel, Maryland, was accepted to both the University of Virginia (about $30,000 a year) and Franklin & Marshall College ($39,930 a year) but decided to attend Howard Community College (about $5,000 a year) as an honors student. It is a somewhat dicey venture, forgoing acceptances to traditional colleges in the hopes of two years of savings and an eventual transfer to even more exclusive schools. Cassels hopes to attend to Barnard or Cornell.
It is worth pointing out that this solution is only viable for students who wish to transfer to relatively large schools. Students who hope to attend exclusive small schools are pretty much out of luck; these schools do not have much room for transfer students.
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ashenden on November 30, 2009 11:43 PM:
I teach at a community college, and this semester I have the best students ever. Half are going to get As, I expect. So just a bit of anecdotal evidence.
Many want to go to nursing school (which is increasingly hard to get into).
But really, if students don't mind foregoing the fun of college for a couple years, here's the money-saving way to go to college:
Decide which 4 year state school you want to graduate from.
Make sure that the school has a transfer-in arrangement with the comm. college (the advisors at the comm college will have this info).
Find out which courses have an automatic transfer WITH CREDIT for a required course. (That is, some courses will transfer as electives-- you want to take the ones that transfer in to replace a required course at the 4 year school, like the English and Math requirement).
Take as many 4 year school required courses as you can at the community college-- usually that is the English/composition courses, the intro Math, and the Communications/Speech. But check of course with the two schools! Usually most of your "general education" requirements will transfer.
Community college tuition is usually about 1/3rd of the 4 year state colleges. So save the rest, and don't get used to the low tuition. :)
Get at least Cs in your courses. But... usually (check!) your 4 year colleges will give credit but not take the grade-- that is, you'll come into the 4 year college with X number of hours, but no grades, so your GPA will reset. That's great if you have a 2.4, but not so great if you have 4.0. What's important is to earn the grade that means the new school will accept your course for credit. That is usually a C.
Don't worry too much about electives-- concentrate on the required gen ed courses. You will want to take all your major courses at the college where you will graduate. Don't take too many at the comm. college-- some won't transfer.
When you've taken all the required/transferrable courses, apply to the 4 year college. Many state universities (even the prestigious ones) are very receptive to good comm college students. There's almost always a state university that has a compact with the cc to admit transfers who have completed certain courses.
Just keep in mind that it's where you graduate from, not where you start from. Save your tuition money for your major classes.
And if you're already at the 4 year school, see if you can take some of the gen ed requirements at the cc. My cc in the summer always has a lot of students at the big schools who take the Math and English required courses cheaply at the cc.
It's not fun, compared to going to frat parties. But the frat parties will still be there your junior year.
Just remember when you go on to a great career that you got an inexpensive start at the cc-- and make a donation to their scholarship fund!