You Won’t Believe The Conversation I Had Today

I’ve always thought that college counselors/advisors were supposed to be there to support you, encourage you, and help guide you in the right direction or at least show you where to go.

Apparently that’s not always the case.

In January of this year I had my first meeting with one. I’ve been attending community college for about 3.5 years so I knew what I was doing for the most part but I had some questions I wanted to sort out to make sure I was going to be graduating as soon as possible. Again, I had been working towards my associate’s degree for three. and a half. years.

She was absolutely lovely. Could not have been better.

She answered all my questions, asked several of her own, reached out to other people for information when she didn’t know the answer, pulled up different sites, cross-referenced her information, everything. She literally took every step possible to make sure I was on the right path and not wasting my time.

Later in the year she even called up a dean for me and requested that I get priority registration because there was a glitch on my account.

She’s my hero.

One of the question she asked me was about attending university after I graduate from the community college.

At the time I was kind of half considering it but was leaning more towards online school because I was working full-time and wanted my focus to be on that.

But there’s a university in the area that I was considering applying to as well, provided they had evening/online classes available (again, making excuses to not go to school because I was completely job-focussed.) However, it’s a great school and I would be crazy if I didn’t put in at least some effort to attend it.

She helped me figure out what other classes I should be taking, told me what GPA I should aim for, and assisted me in finding anything else that could potentially increase my chances of attendance (it’s a fairly competitive university).

Like I said, she’s my hero.

But I wasn’t really planning to attend. Up until a week ago I was strictly trying to do well for myself to prove that I could and to get my associate’s degree so that I had something to show for all the work I’d done.

When I made the decision to actually apply to the university in the Fall I made a decision: I’m only going to apply to the one local university. If I don’t get in, that’s fine. I can go back to working full-time, which I enjoy or find an online program or figure something else out.

In either case, I want to maximize my chances of being accepted as a transfer student to the local university.

So I made another counseling appointment at my college.

My usual advisor was not available so I had to make one with someone I’d never spoken with before.

He straight up told me I wouldn’t get in.

He said that the acceptance rate was so low & their competitiveness so high that it basically wasn’t even worth applying.

WHAT?!

Apparently my major, communications, is considered “niche”. Communications. Niche. Tell that to the other 50% of the population who chose to study it instead of Psychology like everyone else (these numbers are gross exaggerations and should not be taken for fact.)

But I guess since the school mainly focusses on engineering and agriculture that my major is considered niche to this particular school.

And that’s why I shouldn’t bother. Because why get your hopes up for something when you’re just going to fail anyways.

NO.

That is wrong on soOo many levels I can’t even begin to tell you.

If there’s anything I’ve learned in life it’s that if you constantly tell yourself you’re going to fail you won’t even try and by not trying you will be failing yourself.

I will not fail myself.

I think it is complete bullshit to tell a student to not even attempt something.

Even if I had a 2.4 GPA and 0 necessary classes to get into that department, I would expect a counselor to assist me in figuring out how to get my GPA up and what classes to take/things I can do outside of school to increase my chances and give me some semblance of hope.

If you never try, you will only ever fail.

On the positive side, he did answer the simple question I had about my classes.

I am not going to let one bad phone call stop me. It’s always good to keep in mind the risks associated with anything and the various outcomes involved.

Of course I know it’s a competitive school, only 15% of transfer applicants are admitted every year. You know what the Harvard transfer acceptance rate it? 0.97%. Fewer than 1% of students applying to transfer to Harvard are admitted.

I’m not trying to go to Harvard.

Sure, it’s not the 24% transfer acceptance rate of UCLA, nor the 54% transfer acceptance rate of Chapman, but it’s not terrible.

A college advisor should guide you towards your goal, not block you from it.

I know what I’m getting myself into.