How to use ASSIST and plan prerequisites

An articulation agreement is a document between one college and one university that says which of the college’s courses meet which of the university’s requirements. ASSIST (assist.org) is where California publishes them, and UC itself tells transfer students to use it to see which courses transfer and what major preparation each campus expects. Two things follow. The agreement for De Anza is not the agreement for Foothill, even for the same university and major. And an agreement belongs to an academic year: UC Berkeley’s own ASSIST instructions say to choose the year in which you completed the course.

When a requirement shows no course on your college’s side, ASSIST is telling you that, in that agreement for that year, none of your college’s courses is listed as satisfying it. It does not mean the requirement goes away. Cherrypicker shows ASSIST’s own wording instead of rewording it, and counts these separately from articulated requirements. Ask a counselor how your target campus expects you to handle it.

For example, the De Anza to UCLA Psychology pathway (agreement year 2025-26) lists 19 requirements; 19 of them name a De Anza course. A pathway with very few articulated requirements is a sign that most of the preparation will happen after you transfer, so read it with that in mind.

Prerequisites are set by the college, not by ASSIST, so they live in the college catalog. The planning problem is the length of the longest chain: if a course requires the one before it, the chain cannot be shortened by working harder, only by starting it earlier. De Anza and Foothill both run on quarters (fall, winter, spring, plus summer), so a four-course math sequence with each course required for the next takes at least four quarters.

1. Find the longest chain in your major preparation (usually math, then a science or programming sequence) and put its first course in your first quarter.
2. Check which quarters each course is actually offered. Not every course is offered every quarter. A course page and the open classes view show what is running now.
3. Look for a prerequisite that is not on your agreement at all. A course can satisfy a requirement and still need an earlier course, such as a placement or an algebra course, that the agreement never mentions.
4. Keep a grade target in mind. UC requires a C or better in each course, and the college catalog states any minimum grade a prerequisite needs.

Each target is a separate agreement, so list the courses for each and look for overlap. Courses that appear in several of your agreements are the least risky to take early; courses that appear in only one are the ones to settle after you know where you are applying. Do not assume the same course code means the same thing at both FHDA colleges, because the code is scoped to the college.

Cherrypicker keeps the agreements apart on purpose: browse De Anza and Foothill targets, open the pathway for each university, and compare. The UC and CSU planning guide covers the university-level rules that sit on top.

Cherrypicker reads the agreements and the catalog for you, shows the courses and their prerequisites, and, once you sign in, arranges them across quarters. It is a planning aid, not a source of record. Verify the agreement on ASSIST and confirm your plan with a counselor before you register. More about the tool is on the about page.