Understanding UC transfer courses at Santa Monica College

I'm planning on transferring to a UC and currently at Santa Monica College. I'm curious about which courses are essential for a successful transfer. Any suggestions on course planning and prerequisites?

Fantastic question! The best place to start when considering transfer to a UC from a California Community College like Santa Monica College is the Assist.org website. This tool provides information on which courses at your current institution will satisfy major requirements at the UCs.

Let's say you are interested in Psychology. Using Assist.org, you can see which courses at Santa Monica College fulfill the prerequisites for a Psychology major at a UC. For instance, it might tell you the equivalent at UC Berkeley are introductory psychology classes, so you would take this at Santa Monica.

Apart from Assist.org, you can also use UC Transfer Admission Planner (UC TAP) which will help you track and plan your coursework. Here, you can fill in your courses semester by semester, and if there are areas where you're falling short, the system will alert you.

It's also crucially important to fulfill the Intersegmental General Education Transfer Curriculum (IGETC), which takes care of breadth requirements at the UCs, ensuring you're a well-rounded applicant.

Remember also to actively maintain a good GPA – a competitive UC transfer applicant should ideally have at least a 3.4 GPA, although this varies by campus and by major.

Hopefully that gives you a helpful starting point, but I strongly recommend getting in touch with a transfer counselor at Santa Monica College who can provide more personalized advice given your specific aspirations and situation. Good luck with your transfer journey!