Transfer students discouraged by budget cuts

Due to the recent budget cuts affecting California community colleges, many transfer students are beginning to ask questions. Several MJC students are at age for transfer and are following transfer plans.

Before the budget cuts began, several state universities and University of California campuses were on the list for transfer agreements with MJC students. This meant that if a student on a transfer agreement passed all their general education classes with a C or better and completed all major preparation courses they would be guaranteed a spot at their preferred school. Since the cuts, MJC transfer agreements have been greatly reduced in availability. Currently there is only one California state campus available (CSU Stanislaus) and seven UC campuses (UC Davis, UC Merced, UC Irvine, UC Riverside, UC Santa Barbara, UC Santa Cruz and UC San Diego).

Leticia Cavazos the MJC Transfer Center explained the negative impact this will have on students: "Admission requirements will become tighter and four-year campuses will continue to become more selective, our  transfer students are going to find themselves becoming less competitive."   The majority of four year colleges no longer accept lower division transfers, meaning students with a unit completion less than 60.

Four year colleges prefer to have their transfer students complete all their general education and lower division major courses at their previous college. This will be tough for MJC students who have a declared major that has been cut or severely reduced. Transfer students may have to go elsewhere to finish certain classes pertaining to their major. This is especially pertinent to students majoring in communications, media, journalism, engineering, French, German, architecture, computer graphics and art, since these are the programs have been affected the most by cuts.

Transfer students may begin to look to other distant community college campuses that have not been so drastically affected by cuts in order to finish major courses and be able to transfer to a four year campus as an upper division student. Transfer students may need to commute 40 miles or more to a campus that offers their major program and will provide them with the resources necessary to transfer, imposing an increased burden. Not too far down the line, this may also mean decreased enrollment at MJC and higher enrollment at other campuses such as Merced Community College, Sacramento City College, San Joaquin Delta (Stockton), Chabot (Hayward), Las Positas (Livermore) and San Francisco community colleges.