Seth Sageser, president of Texas Transfer Students, said he did not have a good transfer experience at UT.
UT’s goal to get its students to graduate within four years focuses only on traditional students who entered college straight from high school, said Sageser, economics and corporate communications junior.
“That goal is very anti-transfer students, and it’s very anti-nontraditional students,” Sagerser said. “You’re automatically taking all those resources and pushing them towards freshmen, so that means they are going to have first-class selections on things. They are going to have more first-year interest groups dedicated to them, and they are going to have more SG resources.”
Texas Transfer Students is one of the organizations on campus that helps incoming transfer students get access to resources and find a community on campus. Along with Texas Transfer Students, the Transfer-Year Experience Program offers services to assist students’ transition to campus.
Jeffrey Mayo, senior program coordinator for Transfer-Year Experience, said one of the challenges transfer students face is credit transferability.
“A student might come in with quite a few hours that don’t always apply to their degree,” Mayo said. “They might think something will meet the core curriculum requirement, but it won’t, and they might have to use it as an elective. That can extend their time to graduation, which can be frustrating.”
One of the goals of transfer student programs is to get transfer students connected to each other, Mayo said.
“Traditionally, about one in four students is a transfer student, but you wouldn’t know if a transfer student is in your class,” Mayo said. “So we have transfer-year interest groups that are similar to the first-year interest group model that create a built in study group and a social group. We also have transfer-only signature courses, and we have had students saying they were the closest thing to a family community on campus.”
Psychology senior Gaby Morgan, social chair for Texas Transfer Students, said the best way for transfer students to get acclimated to campus is by getting involved.
“I would say put yourself out there in terms of trying out new organizations, even just for the sake of meeting people,” Morgan said. “Take advantage of the different resources or events put on by the University. You will probably get something out of everything you try, so it’s worth it.”
