Press

New Report Finds Transfer Process for Community College Students to Four Year Universities a Complex and Costly Maze

Published
September 12th, 2017
Author
Shae Collins

Study by The Campaign for College Opportunity calls on the state to fund CSU and UC to serve more freshman and transfer students and urges community colleges, CSU and UC to clear the transfer maze.

Los Angeles (September 12, 2017) – The Campaign for College Opportunity today released a new report, “The Transfer Maze: The High Cost to Students and the State of California,” which found that transfer between California Community Colleges and the California State University (CSU), and University of California (UC), is a bureaucratic maze which few students manage to navigate.

The report finds that only 4% of students intending to transfer do so within two years. By six years, only 38% of students transfer. This bodes poorly for California’s economy that is predicted to be 1.1 million bachelor degrees short by 2030. “When 70% of all college students in California attend a community college, a successful transfer path is key to producing the bachelor degrees the state needs and that the majority of students in community college hope to gain,” said Michele Siqueiros, president of the Campaign for College Opportunity.

The report’s analysis finds that because transfer is so complex, community college students take longer to complete their bachelor degrees and spend $36,000 – $38,000 more than a student who started their education at a four-year university. When students are stuck in the transfer maze, state spending rises, tax revenue is lost, and spots for new students are unavailable.

While major transfer reforms have been introduced in the last several years, including the successful Associate Degrees for Transfer (ADT), the process remains complicated and inconsistent across systems, schools, and departments. The report outlines six key factors that construct the transfer maze: .