CUNY’s new Transfer Initiative is set to launch in fall 2025 and aims to reorganize the transfer process across CUNY’s 25 campuses.
This reform, a response to the frequent issue of credit loss during transfers, will ensure students do not lose credits toward their major when moving between schools.
The initiative is expected to streamline the process, making higher education more accessible, affordable and convenient for students across New York City.
Endorsed by CUNY’s Board of Trustees in 2023, it focuses on standardizing coursework and ensuring that credits earned in the first half of a student’s major transfer seamlessly.
With an average savings of $1,220 in excess credits, the new system is designed to reduce wasted time and expenses for students, allowing them to progress more efficiently toward their degrees.
“Our current higher education system stacks the deck against community college students who aspire to earn four-year degrees — denying acceptance of their credits, forcing them to retake courses, and ultimately making their educational journeys longer and costlier than they need to
be,” U.S. Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona said in a 2023 November press release.
In 2023, CUNY’s Board of Trustees passed a resolution directing the University to tackle and fix the broken system.
Page 14 of the 2023 Strategies for Increasing Diversity and Opportunity in Higher Education stated that as a result of the broken transfer system in higher education, students may never transfer, may lose momentum from lost credits or may be unable to earn an intended bachelor’s degree. As a result, students would potentially be left with debt but no degree to pay for it.
The loss of credits when transferring from community colleges to four-year institutions is a widespread issue.
On average, students forfeit about 20% of their credits during the transfer process, which wastes scholarship funds and makes earning a bachelor’s degree more difficult and expensive for transfer students.
The new initiative positions CUNY as a leader in addressing this problem at the institutional level, offering a more equitable path to degree completion.
The process will also allow students to view how their existing credits transfer after being admitted to another CUNY college.
This automation is part of CUNY’s broader effort to ease the transition for students moving between schools.
On its first day, 18,850 students were able to see their transferred credits before deciding which CUNY school to attend instead of having to wait to see how their credits would transfer.
Over 75% of students transferring within the system will have most of their credits in their major transferred once the initiative takes effect.
CUNY is focusing on the six most common transfer majors: accounting, computer science, biology, math, psychology and sociology.
The goal is to align all majors CUNY offers in the future.
