Units, GPA & Residence

Overview

Besides individual course requirements, students have to reach a particular number of units to earn a bachelor's degree, while staying within limits of how many units of a certain type can be applied to the degree as well as GPA criteria to maintain.

 

120-Unit Overall & 40-Unit Upper-Division Minimums to Graduate

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  • 120 units, no exceptions: Earning a minimum of 120 units for a Bachelor's is state law, now exceptions are allowed.
  • Units "Earned": Include in progress units (and future progress units enrolled for an upcoming term). In above example, only 3 units were truly completed in a previous term. 
    • Units are earned toward graduation if a D- or higher, or Credit (if taken under CR/NC), was achieved.
  • General Elective Units: It is possible to finish all specific course requirements before reaching 120 units. In these cases, students must take general elective units (from any course(s) of interest) or a minor could be added) to reach 120 units.
    • Lower-division or upper-division general electives: Typically general electives can be lower- or upper-division, unless upper-division units are needed to meet the 40 unit minimum.
    • Institution taken: General elective units may be taken at other schools, unless:
      1. Transfer caps have already been met (see below) or
      2. Resident units are needed.

Unit Caps

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  • Community college unit cap: Only 70 units of community college (CC) coursework can apply to the 120-unit minimum needed.
    • Note: CC coursework taken beyond 70 units can be used to meet lower-division requirements (e.g., foreign language); it is just that the units for this coursework would not be counted toward the 120 units needed for the degree.
  • Overall transfer unit cap. Up to 90 units total units may be taken at other institutions, but there is still a 70-unit limit on CC coursework. Thus, if a student transfers in 70+ units from CC, then they can transfer up to 20 units from a different 4-year institution. But if student transfers 60 units from CC, they can transfer up to 30 units from a different 4-year university.
  • Credit/No Credit cap:
    • Not listed on the degree evaluation screenshot above, but another cap to keep in mind:
      • Students can elect to take up to 15 units of CR/NC (if courses are only offered as CR/NC, they do not count toward this cap.
      • No major units, or no upper-division minor units, can be taken for Cr/NC (if they are, they will not meet major/minor requirements).

 

Units to Take "in Residence" (@ SDSU)

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  • Most of these units are reached along the way to earning the degree, unless a students transfers in with high units (e.g., 90).
  • If students surpass 120 units but still have residence or specific course requirements left, they will not be able to graduate until all other requirements are met.
  • There is a major residency requirement as well, listed at the bottom of the upper-division major section of the degree evaluation. 

Institution/SDSU and Total/Overall GPAs

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  • Good Academic Standing: Students have more GPA categories than these (listed under Academic Coursework section), but the 2 above are important because they relate to a student remaining in "Good Academic Standing". If either GPA category falls below 2.0, a student will be placed on Academic Notice Links to an external site. and risk Disqualification if they are not able to reach GPA criteria based on their student rank (i.e., freshmen, sophomore, etc.) by the end of the next Fall or Spring term.
  • In the example above, the student has not completed any courses at SDSU yet, thus no courses have been "attempted for a grade" at SDSU and there is no institution GPA.