Best Computer Science school in South Carolina? (X-post from College Search forum)

College Majors Math/Computer Science Majors
1

Just out of curiosity, how are the CS programs in SC? I live in state, and from what I understand so far Clemson has really good engineering (MechE, EE) however I’m not sure how well this translates to having a good CS department. USC, on the other hand, has a great business program, and I also know a lot of people who went to the honors college. However like 90% of the people at the honors college I know are majoring in some sort of premed (bio, biochem, etc). The only person I know of who is majoring in CS is my friend’s brother, however he got a hefty scholarship and USC was one of the only schools he applied at. I also went to a math meet at the College of Charleston in February; one of the speakers (head of Math dept I think) said something about having an amazing Math/CS program, however I don’t know very much about CofC to begin with other than that it’s primarily an LAC (this might be a bad thing :/).

The reason why I am interested in this is because I recently received dual enrollment credit to USC via the PLTW program. I really would like to know how the computer science programs in SC stack up against OOS options in terms of quality, job prospects, etc. considering how sparse information on the topic already is. It stinks that we have amazing schools like Georgia Tech and UNC around the block yet we have to pay a large amount of OOS money to attend them :frowning: . Anyway, thanks!

2

Based on the course listings, it appears that the University of South Carolina has a greater selection of advanced CS courses than Clemson has, particularly in theory (oddly very minimal at Clemson), but also in other topics.

https://www.cse.sc.edu/class
http://www.clemson.edu/ces/computing/current/ug_courses.html

College of Charleston also has a good list CS courses:

http://catalogs.cofc.edu/undergraduate/computer-science-courses.htm

3

My son and I toured the CS department and met with the Dean at CofC early in August . We were very impressed with the program and some specialty opportunities and collaborative opportunities with the School of Business .( Google the ICAT program) They are very well connected in the tech community which is growing very quickly. They have relationships with Google, Blackbaud, Boeing and lots of start ups. It’s definitely worth a visit to meet with someone to see the facilities and discuss their expansion of the department and their facilities. In terms of how the SC programs stack up , they all
Are ABET accredited .