D-Egg07/transfer-course-planning

Transfer Course Planning

This skill turns a student's transfer goal into a term-by-term course plan and a one-page planner per target. Every articulation, GE-area, AP-credit, TAG, or ADT claim must trace to assist.org or a community college's own published chart. Never assert one from memory.

When to use

• "I want to transfer to X and don't know what classes to take"
• "Which of my AP scores count?"
• "Is there a guaranteed option?"
• "What do I still need for my major?"

When not to use

• Non-California community colleges
• Graduate or second-bachelor's transfers
• The articulation agreement is already fully mapped
• Requests for essay or financial-aid help

Step 1 — Intake

Interactive: use the question tool for structured fields, free text for lists. Non-interactive: present as a numbered form.

Field	Notes
From — community college	exact name for assist.org
First term enrolled / GE pattern in progress	tells Cal-GETC students from pre-Fall-2025 IGETC / CSU GE-Breadth students
To — target universities	each primary target gets its own planner
Major + degree flavor	exact assist.org string; B.A. vs B.S. if prep differs
Current term + courses now	—
Prior college coursework + grades	dual enrollment, other CCs, summer
AP / IB exams + scores	—
Target transfer term	or "earliest possible"
Units per term	12 / 15 / 18
Summer courses OK?	—
Guaranteed-admission backup?	UC → TAG, CSU → ADT
Cross / concurrent enrollment at a target?	—
Language background	years of same HS language + grade; native language; AP exam
Constraints	work hours, online-only, courses to avoid, campus prefs

Step 2 — Pull the data

Per target from → to → major: get the assist.org major agreement (see references/assist-navigation.md) and record the catalog year actually used. Get the college's Cal-GETC list; but for a student who began before Fall 2025 and is already on IGETC or CSU GE-Breadth, pull that pattern's list instead and plan against it. Get the college's AP/IB chart. For CSU targets, check the college's catalog for a matching ADT (AA-T / AS-T) and pull its Transfer Model Curriculum. If the university uses its own lower-division GE, pull that campus GE/Breadth agreement too.

Step 3 — Reconcile

Mark current and completed courses against major prep and GE areas. Apply AP/IB to GE areas from the college's chart (never assumed), and to major prep only when the agreement or campus says so (flag "confirm"). Flag every "No Course Articulated" / "must be taken at the university" item as an after-transfer list. A requirement with no completed course and no qualifying AP/IB score is remaining prep — schedule it (do not carry the worked example's AP assumptions to a student who lacks those scores). Compute remaining major prep and GE. See references/reconciliation.md.

Step 4 — Admission scaffolding

Per target: minimum transferable units and junior standing (UC caps transferable credit earned at a community college at 70 semester units toward the degree — see references/reconciliation.md); UC 7-course pattern or CSU Golden Four and deadline terms; minimum vs competitive GPA and any screening-course GPA; the UC language requirement; impacted / screening / capped status (link the campus's own page); the CSU US History, Constitution & American Ideals requirement.

Step 5 — Guaranteed backup

UC → TAG (offered only by Davis, Irvine, Merced, Riverside, Santa Barbara, Santa Cruz — never Berkeley, UCLA, San Diego; filed September 1–30, separately from and before the regular UC application). CSU → an ADT matching the major — this guarantees admission to the CSU system with junior standing, not a specific campus or major, and does not bypass a campus's impaction criteria. If the primary target offers no guarantee, recommend and fully map one that does.

Step 6 — Cross / concurrent enrollment

If the community college participates with the target (check its transfer center), use it for after-transfer-only courses: ~one lower-division course per term, up to two terms, nominal per-unit fee, letter grade required. Ineligible once admitted to any four-year — schedule these before spring admission decisions.

Step 7 — Build the term grid

Fill the current term as given. Distribute remaining courses across terms to the transfer term, respecting prerequisite chains and the unit cap; use summer only if allowed; the last planned term is the spring before the transfer term. Keep a cushion over the 60-unit minimum; show the running total including AP and cross-enrollment units.

Step 8 — Render

Fill templates/planner.html — one artifact per primary target. Always include the caveats block and name the catalog year the agreement came from, noting any fallback to a prior year. See examples/worked-example.md for a full worked case.

Common mistakes

• Asserting an articulation from memory
• Assuming an AP exam's GE area instead of reading the college's chart
• Forgetting the after-transfer courses exist
• Missing that the target has no TAG
• Putting a cross-enrollment course in the final spring term
• Treating Cal-GETC as covering the CSU US History, Constitution & American Ideals requirement
• Ignoring prerequisite chains when sequencing terms

Which guarantee applies?

digraph g {
  rankdir=TB; node [shape=box];
  q1 [label="UC or CSU target?"];
  uc [label="TAG-eligible campus?\n(Davis / Irvine / Merced / Riverside /\nSanta Barbara / Santa Cruz)"];
  csu [label="College offers\na matching ADT?"];
  q1 -> uc [label="UC"];
  q1 -> csu [label="CSU"];
  uc -> "Use TAG track" [label="yes"];
  uc -> "Map TAG-eligible UC as backup" [label="no"];
  csu -> "Use ADT track" [label="yes"];
  csu -> "Map campus + major with ADT path" [label="no"];
}