Hey! I recently applied for transfer to a couple of places, with a few acceptances that have rolled in. After contacting academic advisors from the respective universities concerning the number of credits that will transfer and, based off of that, the time needed to graduate, I am considering the pros and cons of each university but, since I haven't taken these course yet, I am looking for some advice from some people who have. Right now, I am looking at a degree plan that an academic advisor gave to me for my case that seems to be just a rough look at what I would have to take in order to graduate a little more than the usual 4 years and am wondering about the reasonability of the course load for the foreseeable future. Oh, and by the way, I just finished my sophomore year with about 60 credits. Here's the degree plan divided by semester:
Fall2020:
organic chemistry I (3 hrs)
organic chemistry I lab (1 hr)
molecular cell biology (3 hrs)
college physics 1 (4 hrs)
statistics for biology (3 hrs)
Spring 2021:
organic chemistry II (3 hrs)
organic chemistry II lab (1 hr)
genes ecology evolution (3 hrs)
college physics 2 (4 hrs)
core curriculum elective (3 hrs)
Summer 2021:
biochemistry I (3 hrs)
core curriculum electives (6 hours)
Fall 2021:
biochemistry II (3 hrs)
principles of genetics (3 hrs)
genetics laboratory (1 hr)
cell biology (3 hrs)
cell biology lab (2 hrs)
microbiology (4 hrs)
Spring 2022:
molecular genetics (3 hrs)
molecular genetics lab (2 hrs)
developmental biology (3 hrs)
core curriculum electives (6 hours)
free elective (2-3 hours)
Fall 2022:
core curriculum electives (6 hrs)
molecular cell electives (6 hrs)
free elective (3 hrs)
This would total to 6 semesters worth of coursework, which would total to about 10 semesters of coursework overall when added to the previous two years of coursework I've already completed. Even with roughly 60 credits, barely a few transferred over to contribute to my degree plan and it's almost like starting from scratch to get my bachelor's degree with the astonishingly few credits that have transferred over to usefully be used towards my degree. Most of the courses listed in the beginning of this tentative degree plan are ones I have already covered in content with the courses I have already done and to do them again is quite frustrating even though the course overlap is very clear when comparing course competencies and just the overall title of the course. This is an issue that I've noticed most transfer students deal with, however, I've heard of transfer applicants going on to complete their degree within 4 years. With the degree plan here, I would complete it within about 4 1/2 years, which effectively is 5. My goal is to just try to cut this down to the standard 4 years. Any advice over the difficulty of handling a course load like this from semester to semester would be greatly appreciated! Also, any advice over how to adjust this course schedule in order to graduate in 4 years rather than longer would be great! I think I should also mention that, before finding out about the issue of transferring credits and how that will affect the time needed to graduate, I was hoping to take the next two years left of undergrad to go part-time to sonography school while taking coursework to complete my bachelor's degree. Not sure if that would be a reasonable possibility and if anyone has some advice on if it would be worth juggling that so that I could have an RDMS certification on my med school app, that would also be greatly appreciated!
Thanks in advance!!!!
Fall2020:
organic chemistry I (3 hrs)
organic chemistry I lab (1 hr)
molecular cell biology (3 hrs)
college physics 1 (4 hrs)
statistics for biology (3 hrs)
Spring 2021:
organic chemistry II (3 hrs)
organic chemistry II lab (1 hr)
genes ecology evolution (3 hrs)
college physics 2 (4 hrs)
core curriculum elective (3 hrs)
Summer 2021:
biochemistry I (3 hrs)
core curriculum electives (6 hours)
Fall 2021:
biochemistry II (3 hrs)
principles of genetics (3 hrs)
genetics laboratory (1 hr)
cell biology (3 hrs)
cell biology lab (2 hrs)
microbiology (4 hrs)
Spring 2022:
molecular genetics (3 hrs)
molecular genetics lab (2 hrs)
developmental biology (3 hrs)
core curriculum electives (6 hours)
free elective (2-3 hours)
Fall 2022:
core curriculum electives (6 hrs)
molecular cell electives (6 hrs)
free elective (3 hrs)
This would total to 6 semesters worth of coursework, which would total to about 10 semesters of coursework overall when added to the previous two years of coursework I've already completed. Even with roughly 60 credits, barely a few transferred over to contribute to my degree plan and it's almost like starting from scratch to get my bachelor's degree with the astonishingly few credits that have transferred over to usefully be used towards my degree. Most of the courses listed in the beginning of this tentative degree plan are ones I have already covered in content with the courses I have already done and to do them again is quite frustrating even though the course overlap is very clear when comparing course competencies and just the overall title of the course. This is an issue that I've noticed most transfer students deal with, however, I've heard of transfer applicants going on to complete their degree within 4 years. With the degree plan here, I would complete it within about 4 1/2 years, which effectively is 5. My goal is to just try to cut this down to the standard 4 years. Any advice over the difficulty of handling a course load like this from semester to semester would be greatly appreciated! Also, any advice over how to adjust this course schedule in order to graduate in 4 years rather than longer would be great! I think I should also mention that, before finding out about the issue of transferring credits and how that will affect the time needed to graduate, I was hoping to take the next two years left of undergrad to go part-time to sonography school while taking coursework to complete my bachelor's degree. Not sure if that would be a reasonable possibility and if anyone has some advice on if it would be worth juggling that so that I could have an RDMS certification on my med school app, that would also be greatly appreciated!
Thanks in advance!!!!
