The summer between high school and college as a point of intervention to help more students successfully transition from the K-12 sector to higher education is gaining notice. This qualitative study builds on recent research on the "summer melt" and offers a fresh perspective of students from an urban Los Angeles public high school who, despite being qualified for and accepted to college, failed to immediately transition to college after high school. Schlossberg's Transition Theory is used to better understand the challenges that college-intending students encounter between high school graduation and successful college matriculation. An emphasis is placed on the challenges faced by low-income racial/ethnic minority students during the summer before college.