The Teaching Transfer Initiative (TTI) is an academic outreach pilot program led by Princeton University in partnership with Mercer County Community College (MCCC) and Rowan College of South Jersey (RCSJ). Designed to encourage community college students to explore and transfer to four-year institutions, the program offers Princeton-accredited courses, at no charge, on our community college partner campuses to select community college students.

These courses are designed to offer you a chance to study exciting topics and cutting-edge research perspectives on a subject that you might not encounter in typical community college courses. Our hope is that your experience in TTI might expand your imagination about what you could do if you transferred to a four-year institution. The TTI faculty are also particularly invested in supporting and advising you in your transfer journey. We hope that the experience of seeing yourself succeeding in a Princeton course will build your confidence about your academic potential, and the evidence of your accomplishment in this course on your Princeton transcript will be a valuable signal in your transfer application that you’re already capable of success. 

Students must have successfully completed high school or earned a GED, and at least the equivalent of one semester (3 or 4 courses) at the college level, typically at the host community college. Students must not already be enrolled at a four-year institution, and must not already have a BA or BS degree. Dual enrollment students are not eligible to participate in TTI courses.

No, these classes are being offered free of charge. If you are admitted you will not be charged tuition, and course materials such as books will be provided to you at no charge. 

Classes are hosted at the community college. Your professor may schedule trips relevant to the course, but otherwise you can expect class to meet at the community college.

You may choose to ask your community college to accept your Princeton transfer credit. It will be up to the community college to determine whether to accept the transfer credit, and if accepted, if and how it will count toward degree requirements. 

You may apply for transfer credit for your Princeton course, and it will be up to that institution to decide whether or not to accept it, and if accepted, how it will be counted. We believe Princeton credits will have a high likelihood of being accepted for some form of transfer credit.

Students must be nominated by faculty or a staff member from their community college. Feel free to request a nomination from your professor or other community college staff member. Once nominated, you’ll receive an application.

The application asks for basic information (name, date of birth, address, etc.), unofficial transcripts from your community college and other past institutions, a brief personal statement about why you’d like to take a TTI course and how it fits into your goals, and an example of a graded written paper. 

A committee including staff from Princeton University and the community college will make admissions decisions. To be eligible, students should demonstrate their ability to excel in college coursework, including showing their engagement with class materials, discussions, and activities, and their desire to learn more. 

We want this course to be an enriching yet manageable experience for you, so we will be evaluating your application for evidence that you are academically prepared to succeed in the Princeton course, and that your participation in the program will enhance your exploration of and preparation for transfer to an excellent 4-year institution. 

TTI courses are rigorous and will require a significant time commitment. Additionally, the program hopes to offer as many qualified students the opportunity to take a TTI course as possible.  For these reasons, in most cases an accepted student will take only one Princeton course. 

Admitted students will participate in a brief orientation at their campus before the start of the semester, which will explain key policies and how the process will work.  Although the course will take place at your community college, you will be enrolled as a non-degree student with Princeton University during the semester when you’re taking the TTI course at your community college. This means you will be issued a Princeton email address, access to Princeton systems such as our course information system and our libraries’ electronic resources, and at the end of the course, you will receive a Princeton transcript. 

Please note that Princeton courses follow the Princeton academic calendar, which is slightly different from our partner institutions.

Yes, academic support will be available to TTI students. The McGraw Center for Teaching and Learning at Princeton offers tutoring, academic strategies workshops, and learning consultations, and the Writing Program offers writing consultations. Most services will be offered on Princeton’s campus, but TTI students will be welcome to make use of these supports in person, or online when programs are offered virtually.

Please visit the registrar's webpage for more information. If you can access TigerHub, you should log in and request your transcript there. If you do not have access to TigerHub, you should download the request form and send in the completed form as a pdf attachment to [email protected].