UC Berkeley student with low GPA.. hesitant about my plan, need some advice.!

[natenate1020]

---

Members do not see this ad.

Hello, fellow SDN users. I first appreciate your valuable time to click into my post and read it and hopefully give me some useful and essential advice
heheh.😀

Okay, so.. to briefly explain my situation, I attended UC Berkeley from the
year of 2005 as a freshman through the year of 2007 and withdrew due to
high stress from school(partly due to doing extremely poor in acadmics)
and uncertainty about my career. Since then, I have been taking a break
without really doing anything particular. ( Yea, I mean absolutely nothing at all, seriously 😱)So far, I have zero volunteer work in a community. I have no clinical experience whatsoever.

In addition, to give you an idea of how poorly I did academically in my freshman and sophomore year of college, I got C from general chemistry, C from calculus, failed first o-chem twice and passed the third time with a B, got a B from second o-chem, got C's in bio. (Pretty devastating, right?😡) And Im pretty sure that you can guess how poorly I did in non-science courses.

Although I perceive myself not that stupid(graduated high school as top of
the class), I nearly quit studying once I got into college due to so much
social activities I was really into, which I really regret. Furthermore, my
self-esteem just plummeted to the lowest.. and that's probably why I
decided to take time off. I just wanted some time to recoup everything
I've lost, whatever that is, or.. I wanted to believe so.


But.. I also realized that after I failed my first two years of college, I was
overwhelmed and surrounded by all these negative thoughts these past
years since I withdrew from school. And then recently, this determination
came in my mind that I shouldn't give up. At least.. I gotta try..


So.. my question is this (sorry, my intro was quite a bit long!!! =_= )

Should I go back to Berkeley and try to raise my GPA? So far, I have
completed a little less than 70 units. or... should I just start all over at
a community college and transfer to another university? (yea, I know that I can't really start all over and I still have to list all the grades in the past) I am leaning towards the option of transferring to another university and doing well there. The only thing that really makes me reluctant to choose the first option to go back to berkeley is that I really lost all my confidence from that school. I am not just sure if I can do well at that school.

Furthermore, I think if I choose the second option I'll actually have more time to go volunteer in a hospital and gain some clinical experience whereas I will hardly have time to do those if I choose to go back to Berkeley cuz I think Berkeley will be still tough although I may try a lot harder and put my full effort into it. I think what is most important for me now is to regain self-confidence that was long gone, and I think going back to berkeley may not do me any good for giving me self-esteem back. Well these are just my thoughts..



So... please give me as many advice as possible!!! You can even criticize

me if I am sounding like all pessimistic and acting like a loser!! heheh


Thank you again for reading my post!!!! You are the best!!!👍

 

[natenate1020]

Im sad T_T

 

[Appless]

Im sad T_T

well i was in a somewhat similar situation to you, did poorly then dropped out (though i did it long before you did it seems as i only had like 20 credits). So i had like a 1.2 GPA when i restarted lol. I did the CC route instead of restarting at the same school. I went 2 yrs at a CC, then transferred to a UC. I dont want to speculate on your chances but if i was you, id start at a local CC, during this time and for the future you need nothing less then straight A's...it sounds like you did so bad that even if you got 2-3 years of A's, you still may not even be near a 3.5 level but like i said idk really. The biggest issue i see with you is all your pre med reqs you have taken it seems and done so poorly that your sGPA is going to suffer horribly. For me it was somewhat lucky in that the 1.2 i had was basically all non-science therefore only really affecting my cGPA, which i was able to make up over 4 years of college somewhat.

so go to a CC focus on grades and volunteering, then transfer and hope it leads to success. It was tough these past 4 years having to make sure you got nothing less then A's...but it can be done its just going to take a massive overhaul of how you do things and your life. I made school my life as sad as that is in some ways as I knew I had already screwed up big time, and there was no more room for even one error. In the end it worked out as im applying now and have been accepted. Good luck 🙂

 

[natenate1020]

hey, Elijah 05,

did u take honors courses at a community college or did you just take regular courses...?

 

[KingstonPre]

Same situation here as well, i was dropped Freshman year for attendance issues, and basically started over two years later with 0.0GPA on 16 credits.

I've had pretty much all A's over the past 3 years... with a B and a C somewhere in there.

My advice,

I definitely recommend the CC route to you.

Go in there with the attitude that no one in your class should be getting higher grades than you, this is your second time around...

 

[eureka7]

i am in a similar boat. I am in berkely i have about 80 units right now and i have not done well, been getting only B and Cs on the prereqs, some i have retaken and have overall gpa below 3.0. I am considering restarting from a CC and reapply to a different university. I know i would be losing the 80 units but is it possible to restart and apply to a different university. Is it possible to do this? It would be great to have more information, same as OP

 

[anonymousername]

i am in a similar boat. I am in berkely i have about 80 units right now and i have not done well, been getting only B and Cs on the prereqs, some i have retaken and have overall gpa below 3.0. I am considering restarting from a CC and reapply to a different university. I know i would be losing the 80 units but is it possible to restart and apply to a different university. Is it possible to do this? It would be great to have more information, same as OP

no. The grades you get stay with you through your entire academic career.

 

[eureka7]

so does that mean if i transfer community college to another university the units berkeley will carry over as well?

 

[johncronejr]

no. The grades you get stay with you through your entire academic career.

You can get academic clemency at some universities if it has been a certain amount of time since your first attempt at college and your second.

I attended college the first time in 1986 as a 20 year old fresh out of active duty service and saw college as a non-stop party. I dropped out after a year with a 1.4 gpa and went to work. I decided to go back to college in 2006 and a 41 year old who had been on the wild rollercoaster we call life and had a lot more self discipline. The university offered me academic clemency. As long as I maintained a certain gpa through my first year, they would erase my previous foray into college. I now have a 3.96 gpa and a good explanation of my history should it ever come up.

Bottom line: You can no longer do anything about your past grades. Academic clemency may or may not erase them. You can, however, do plenty about your future grades. If you believe you want to be a MD, PT, RN, etc....then go back, do your best and be truthful if anyone asks about your first try. Don't BS anyone with "well there was so much going on in my life, blah blah blah". Just own up to the fact that you didn't apply yourself, you regrouped and for the past 4 years you excelled. At this point, you can do no better than that. Don't get bogged down in the incidentals.

 

[TNK123]

First, don't beat yourself up...Berkeley is tough. Most people on this board complain about a 3.75, but most Berkeley undergrads struggle to get 3.5. I just graduated...double major IB and ethnic studies. I think taking humanities courses while taking one science class at a time helped me out quite a bit. Also, I would look into the BSP program if you are untraditional, from underserved community or URM; they really help you out. I got my *ss handed to me my sophomore year... C's in chem 1A AND Bio 1B. But I eventually joined BSP and it made a world of difference.

I would finish strong at Berkeley and do a post-Bac if I were you--If you shy away from UCB, the school will wonder why and it will count as a point against you...sticking it out shows perseverance...Also, the upper divs are much easier than the lower divs in general (at least in my opinion)

 

[jl lin]

You can get academic clemency at some universities if it has been a certain amount of time since your first attempt at college and your second.

I attended college the first time in 1986 as a 20 year old fresh out of active duty service and saw college as a non-stop party. I dropped out after a year with a 1.4 gpa and went to work. I decided to go back to college in 2006 and a 41 year old who had been on the wild rollercoaster we call life and had a lot more self discipline. The university offered me academic clemency. As long as I maintained a certain gpa through my first year, they would erase my previous foray into college. I now have a 3.96 gpa and a good explanation of my history should it ever come up.

Bottom line: You can no longer do anything about your past grades. Academic clemency may or may not erase them. You can, however, do plenty about your future grades. If you believe you want to be a MD, PT, RN, etc....then go back, do your best and be truthful if anyone asks about your first try. Don't BS anyone with "well there was so much going on in my life, blah blah blah". Just own up to the fact that you didn't apply yourself, you regrouped and for the past 4 years you excelled. At this point, you can do no better than that. Don't get bogged down in the incidentals.

I thought there is no such thing as academic clemency as far as AMCAS is concerned. I mean it's a stickler kind of system it seems. Don't know about what this clemency means in terms of what the particular schools actually put on the transcripts.

Hmmm. Personally I don't see the need to be so extreme if someone has really made a substantial comeback. I mean in the workplace it's all about "What have you done lately?" I mean you could have many great things listed on your CV in the past, yet it only counts so much in the business world and any other industry/profession.

Why does the good stuff get pushed aside if it is not recent enough; yet if you somehow messed up but made a serious comeback, it will still be held against you???? Seems like the negative stuff is mostly what carries and that seems quite imbalanced to me.

Ah well.. .

 

[natenate1020]

Thank you all for replaying to my question and having a great discussion.

Arrrr.... so yea... I still can't really make up really my mind. As you have

all mentioned, I can't exactly start all over although I take a CC route and go

to another 4 year university. My record stays there..


But honestly, I have no good memory about Berkeley. I am really scared and

nervous to go back to the school. I seriously am. hah... by the way. hey,

Eureka. do you mind giving me your contact so that we can share some

information we have ...? please let me know your aim or your e-mail or

something. My e-mail is [email protected]