<p>UMD Computer Science Major is ranked as 15th, and JHU Computer Science Major is ranked as 28th in usnews.com.</p>
<p>However, UMD as a whole school is ranked as #62, while JHU is ranked as #12 in usnews.com. </p>
<p>I want to apply for Computer Science Major, and if I get accepted by both schools, which one should I attend (take out the consideration of tuition difference between the two schools)? </p>
<p>It doesn’t really matter which one you go to. I’ve never seen an employer look up CS rankings for a school when making a hiring decision.</p>
<p>I like the different tracks that Hopkins offers. If it was me, I’d go there.</p>
<p>How significant is the cost difference to you? I.e. would the more expensive one require a lot of debt?</p>
<p>In general, I think that employers probably value the overall school rank more highly than the rank in major.</p>
<p>UMD may be more attractive to an employer specifically looking for CS majors, since there are probably about 150 per year there, versus about 30 per year at JHU. But the opposite may be true for employers who are more school-prestige-conscious (e.g. management consulting).</p>
<p>You are looking at the graduate program rankings for computer science. For good reason, most undergraduate majors are not ranked. First of all, you may change your major. Second of all, while I believe that graduate program quality and undergraduate curriculum quality are probably highly correlated, one doesn’t necessarily map perfectly onto the other. UMD-College Park’s professors may ignore all of their undergraduates and offer only a limited number of undergrad CS classes because they devote all their energy to the grad students. (An extreme exaggeration, of course, but you get the point.) Or maybe none of those famous professors actually teach undergrad classes, and they hire adjunct professors or grad students to teach your intro lectures. Or maybe it’s really difficult to get into research labs until your senior year, while JHU - technically a lower-ranked graduate program - doesn’t have those problems for undergrads. (All hypothetical, of course.)</p>
<p>Not to mention that you only take about 1/3 of your courses in your major department, so you will be concerned with the academics of the rest of the school. What are the students like? Are there any other co-curricular options that appeal? For example, a die-hard CS major who is interested in the application of CS to biomedical and health fields might find JHU more appealing because of their focus on, and research in, those areas. Or are the career services, internship opportunities, and/or study abroad options better at one particular school? Even though UMD is “lower-ranked” it might have a career services office that blows JHU’s out of the water. (Again, I don’t know. I’m just giving hypotheticals.)</p>
<p>In the end though, I don’t think it would matter. Both of them are excellent universities and you would get a great education at either, and they’re both well respected for careers - especially if you were staying in the mid-Atlantic region (or the East Coast in general). If you are an MD resident the tuition discount at UMD is probably appealing, but JHU might offer you significant financial aid.</p>
<p>So first of all, this might be a moot point because you may only be admitted to one of them.
This secondly might be a moot point because even if you are accepted to both, you may only be able to afford one of them.</p>
<p>On the off chance that you are admitted and funded well at both, have you visited the schools? A visit might help you decide.</p>
<p>You’ll get a great education in CS at either school. It’s what you do at the school that matters to employers, so get good grades and good internships and make your time interning memorable to the company. You can do that wherever you go, so don’t blow a wad of cash on a JHU education because the 40K difference in annual cost will take a long time to pay back.</p>