You heard about Joshua Halberstam's The Community College Guide and you want the useful parts without buying a 244-page book. Fair. It's a good book by someone who teaches at a community college. Here's what's in it, free, in two minutes.
The book itself isn't free, it's a paid paperback from 2009. The free part is the plan. You can just use a website like Transfermatic that builds your semester-by-semester schedule around your school and your major, then read the book whenever.
Joshua Halberstam: The Community College Guide, in plain English
Twenty short chapters, application through graduation. Money, registering, studying, plagiarism, clubs, online classes, transferring, the first job, and a glossary of college words nobody explains to you.
The key points, so you don't have to read it
- You're not at a backup school. Roughly half the college students in the country are at a community college. The book opens here on purpose and never wavers.
- You'll pay less than you think and there's more aid than you think. The catch is deadlines, which land earlier than anyone tells you.
- Your first schedule matters more than any single class. Read the requirements before you register, not during add/drop.
- Treat time like the real constraint. Time management gets its own chapter. So does sleeping and eating like a person.
- Plagiarism is usually an accident. Bad citing, recycled work, "help" from a friend. Learn the rules once instead of explaining yourself later.
- Start your transfer plan in semester one. Not year two. This is the one that decides whether you finish in two years or four.
Where a book can't help you
That last point is right, and it's where the book runs out of road. Transferring isn't general advice. It comes down to your community college, your target school, and your major, and the requirements move year to year. A 2009 book can't know that Cal-GETC replaced IGETC, or which four classes UCLA wants for your major, or which of those your campus only offers in spring.
That's what actually costs people a year. Not one bad grade. No plan. So take the mindset from the book, and get the real course list for your school and your major somewhere it stays current.
“A book can tell you what transferring is. It can't tell you what your next four classes are.
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The bottom line
Those bullets are most of the value. Buy it if you want the long version, it's kind and it's cheap used. Just don't expect it to tell you what to register for. That comes from a website like Transfermatic that turns your school and your major into an actual semester-by-semester plan. Read the book on the bus. Build the plan first.
Related: Browse transfer plans by community college · 5 community college transfer mistakes that cost a year · How to transfer from a community college to a UC · What Cal-GETC is and how to transfer with it
