@KWZ2019 Bitter? I was rejected by UT due to silly state laws that grant top 7% admission to in-state students. If you are lucky enough get in UT being out of state then be happy and don’t rain on anyone’s parade. Everyone gets rejected so deal with it. If you are saving 200k then you must be in-state. Hook’em horns!
My D got into CS in SCS and accepted the offer. She was accepted to UCs and other top colleges, but decided to join CMU.
For those who want to objectively assess the CS ranking, use csrankings.org where you can find the research papers published by colleges for the last 10 years. We found this site very useful for deciding on the school.
@HoustonTxDad Have you decided? My D is busy with AP exams and has no time visiting the college at this point. Do you know when is the registration for accepted students? Thanks.
You were supposed to formally commit by May 1, housing and dining application is due May 31.
@cbound2023 ^ hope that helps. I was accepted ed and have visited so if you have any questions feel free to ask and I will try my best to help. They also have a very helpful office.
@ElfishPresely For Priority WL, the acceptance date is 72-hr after after they have offered a position.
If you divide the publication # by faculty #, the ranking will be different. Undergraduate study has not much to do with faculty publications.
Be aware that MIT is reorganizing and expanding their whole CS department with an AI orientation. Their website should have plenty of material on this. This gives CS a separate identity at MIT, whereas before it was half of the EECS department.
I don’t know how long CMU can keep that #1 position with MIT taking aim at it.
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@oniongrass MIT has had multidisciplinary CS for 30 years with the Media Lab and EECS was more than half CS for a while now. EECS has offered economics/CS degrees and biology/bioinformatics/CS degrees, and other combination degrees for a long while.
MIT is hiring 50 new faculty, but 25 of those will come from other MIT departments like economics and biology, and moved CSAIL into the new Swartzman College of CS. So some but not all CS is moving from EECS to the new CS department. The CS department is heavily focused on double majors, so chemistry plus CS, or biology plus CS or economics plus CS as MIT believes every field is using AI. I guess we’ll see. I am worried that MIT will poach too many CS faculty from fine programs, even some from CMU, in fact, as Cambridge/Boston is a popular place to live, and MIT a very good employer.
EECS at MIT is also all the optics, some semiconductor and applied physics research. So its always been a huge department that includes some materials scientists too although there are separate departments. ECE is buried into EECS at MIT.
CMU has more separation with ECE dominating their EE. EE is stronger at MIT than CMU.
Computer science, it depends on the field, Robotics better at CMU. Theory better at MIT.
languages better at CMU.
For an undergrad, maybe this all does not matter much, CMU and mIT are very similar for undergrad education.
MIT requires more science classes like chemistry and biology for the computer science degree. All MIT students must take and pass a 8 humanities and social science classes, too. So the MIT degree is a bit less specialized, compared to GaTech or CMU’s degree programs.
Thank you all!! i am going share my thoughts in random order (lack of sleep), I am sharing so that they may help someone else. We flew out to PIT on Monday evening and reached at mid-night and we were at CMU campus by 7.30am. Finally reached back to Houston very late last night after three weather and floods delays. So pardon my unorganized thoughts here…
My D’s interests all along were: CS + Business (with entrepreneurship preparation)
Even though money should be an important factor. We are at a place financially and commitment to education where we don’t want that to effect the decision. We are ready to pay full fees. Said that there are other items that are weighing on us. My D is a social bee and likes to do things together. We spent yesterday till noon at CMU. We didn’t have any appointments so all our interactions were impromptu and to some degree we initiated/imposed. First at GHC (which is CSC building like GDC at UT). Mary a CSC department admin/student guidance counselor (?) was SUPER nice. She gave a comforting feel to us and you belong here feeling. Since it’s exams week, nobody else in the admin could help us (we didn’t ask also) with student ambassadors conversation. We rolled around the multi story building and did some people watching.
Then we went to Tepper school building and we talked to general CMU welcome center lady (forgot the name, we should have card in the stack) and talked about dorms/food etc… She was nice too. Next stop is at Tepper undergrad office. Our impromptu interaction with an adviser wasn’t exciting. She wasn’t rude, but we left with questions marks in our mind about D’s ability to do double major in CS and Business. Good news is: D can definitely do CS major and minor in Business.
We talked to couple of desi (South Asian origin looking) students near Tepper coffee shop. They were nice and had positive things to say about CMU. In general everybody was saying SCS department takes care of their students, we even sensed a bit of envy when people were giving this compliment about SCS.
We are still not sure how AP credit’s work at CMU (even after looking at handout). It seems, courses CMU gives credit for are not in the CS degree plan. So confusion is: Then what is the benefit of those credits. If I could ping someone on this specific topic, we would be much obliged.
General observation: We didn’t find ANY student with a smile on their face. To be fair it’s exam week and we are only there till noon. Not many students are early-birds. We also felt the look on their faces is also due to (some degree) each one of the student is on an independent mission (nothing wrong with it). We didn’t feel any meanness in them but its more of studious feel. Again this is exam week.
We were focusing on 2 aspects in our visit. 1) Can my D assimilate and enjoy/excel at CMU college 2) Can she get the education she wants (CS+Business). We left with questions on both of these topics that are important to us. Assimilation has two parts: a) Sunny Houston weather to Pittsburgh weather acclamation b) Having to partner with very focused highly talented student peers (fun aspects) 2) Without getting AP credits she would have to do bunch of humanities courses which is not excited about, at UT she could double major and more.
To the comment on UT admissions process VS CMU. I wouldn’t be that harsh, I agree the admissions process is not perfect. My D and I were baffled when UT wouldn’t give her any honors even though she is a Val from a TOP 3 public schools in TX, with scores like 1580(Sat), 800/800(Math-ii, Physics), NMF, 15 AP (with 4-5), gr8 recommendations. Even professors can make mistakes and have biases (which i sensed in one of UT Turing information session, they look for certain TX high schools) as they are also humans. If she chooses UT, she is going there with a chip on the shoulder. UT CSB was her overall first choice.
My D is out to school today to write AP Lit exam without any preparation. i told her don’t worry we have a good problem, we can’t be wrong with either option and we will make a decision tomorrow (due date).
Now my request is: Please let me know if you have a child in CMU CSC and know how AP credits work and can take my PM. I will be specific.
Thank you all!!
@Coloradomama I found CMU CSC degree plan also needs 6-8 humanities, 4 Science courses and/or with a science lab. Like you mentioned MIT UG asks for them. This is the place UT is looking more attractive to my D as she wants to use those slots for other CS/Business courses.
@HoustonTxDad Thanks for sharing your experience. We are yet to make a trip to CMU as my D is busy with AP exams. We spoke to one of our family friends daughter who graduated from SCS last year and currently working in FB. She said CMU is very lenient in transferring the AP credits and she had to take only 2 humanities courses. We plan to visit the campus and share our experience too.
@houston If you feel that AP classes are important to cover GEs then Texas would be the better route. I too would enter as a Junior in my state flagship but at CMU I will likely only be eligible to get credit for 5-6 classes(general electives). I spent time with a guidance counselor to discuss in detail for the BCSA path. Adding a minor like business would provide for additional class credits but not many.
I found that the list of AP classes list on CMU website is comprehensive and can provide you with all the information you need when you compare to the curriculum for the specific major/minor. I also understand that double majors are harder to get so this is likely why you didn’t get a lot from Tepper as this is a cross platform double.
@HoustonTxDad
“General observation: We didn’t find ANY student with a smile on their face. To be fair it’s exam week and we are only there till noon. Not many students are early-birds. We also felt the look on their faces is also due to (some degree) each one of the student is on an independent mission (nothing wrong with it). We didn’t feel any meanness in them but its more of studious feel. Again this is exam week.”
Your comment above is the number one reason I was concerned with S19 applying to CMU. S19 has been extremely involved in programs here since a child and this is a very accurate observation on your part, no matter what week you are there. PM me with any further questions.
@HoustonTxDad My son is a junior studying MechE. He is doing a business minor and it was pretty easy to do. He needed some electives and chose business classes. He found the business classes much easier as compared to the engineering core. So after a few classes he inquired and now has formally added the business minor to his degree, you need a 3.0 Cumulative GPA and 3.0 business GPA for it. CMU is very helpful in finding the right mix of classes for the student. A friends daughter created her own curriculum and got it approved for a business major with Japanese minor. (Yes, all basic core was required). My son is embedding Master level classes starting in fall 2019 so he can finish the Master in mechanical Engineering by Dec of 2020. His normal graduation date is May 2020 for the bachelors but he was able to speed that up a bit since they accepted 5 of his 10 AP classes.
Thank you all again.
I notice 4 course science/engineering requirement is needed for BS degrees. With AP Chem(5), AP Bio (5) giving credits for 09-105, and 03-110, it looks like students still need to do one Science/Eng course along with a lab course. Is that right way to look at it?
With AP Psych(5), English Lang(5), English Lit (5), Macro(5), US Gov (5), US History(5), World History (5), Statistics(5); how many (and which of these) can be used for Humanities and Arts course credits? She was planning to take Micro economics course at HCC as it can be transferred to UT.
Thank you!!
We did not go during exams and found the same to be true. Kids did not look happy. School was eliminated.
Unhappy or serious? I spoke to lots of kids in SCS and CFA and found all to be friendly and helpful with the exception of one SCS girl that was different. I was welcomed by students to accompany them to CFA classes and in SCS a student escorted me to a professor that gladly spend 45 minutes with me talking about the program.
CMU is a very serous school but the interactions I had were very positive and I feel that I will find lots of positive students to interact with.