transfer student

Each day brings upon new opportunities to learn about who I am here and what’s available to me. I’ve made mistakes along the way, but I’ve also learned to grow from them.

As a new junior transfer student, I came into UC Berkeley expecting to meet many new people and make a whole roster of new friends. What I didn’t expect was that I would form an enemy after only a month of attending. Surprisingly, my new enemy was not the clubs who rejected me, professors who assigned too much work or the tiresome walks up the campus’ hills – my enemy was imposter syndrome. 

A heaviness, something I couldn't describe, plagued my high school years. I didn’t know what achievement and pride felt like, so I'd never pursued them.

He simply needed to hear the reasons why what he believed in was wrong, and my initial attempt at doing that wasn’t empathetic or conducive enough.

Since being admitted to UC Berkeley, I was fixated on being “the” Berkeley student. I was going to replicate my “success” of my community college days while redeeming myself from my failures in high school.

In a way, I’m stuck, afraid of all the bittersweet decisions I could possibly make — decisions that can sour with regret as fast as the spread of a virus.

I told him I was attending UC Berkeley, and as I explained my experience as a transfer student, I began to realize that the process of donating blood was surprisingly comparable. 

Founded in August 1999, the UC Berkeley Transfer Student Center is celebrating its 20th anniversary.

I want to take advantage of all the opportunities and resources we have here at UC Berkeley before I am no longer a student.

My first year at UC Berkeley has given me the impression that making friends here isn’t as easy as it was in community college. Just living in the vicinity of other students did not mean I was going to have friends.