I’m more interested in the industry aspect of CS (versus academia) and the entrepreneurial culture. Any thoughts would be appreciated. Thanks!
@StrugglingWithCollege101 Well, you’ve got a great struggle! All 3 will have great instruction, good entrepreneurial culture. Berkley probably best “start up” access, but Silicon Beach and Pittsburg have a good, growing, perhaps even “before the curve” incubator culture. USC CS is great particularly if you are at all interested in gaming/animation/entertainment side of the coin.
I’m not really an expert, but I’d look in to the difference in outcome for the engineering and L&S CS students at Cal. Dunno if there is a noticable difference in track or rep but CS at Cal is certainly well respected.
CMU is obvioulsy highly regarded, but there is a real geographical difference between Cal/USC and CMU. Where do think you’ll end up? (Not that you can travel with any of those degrees, but the networking will be more organic from Cal or SC if you think you want to end up in Cal. CMU will have a bit less natural access there, obvioulsy, but there’s a lot going on in Pittsburg/Philly/NYC obviously.
One thing, whether this matters or not, CMU and USC report having a much better gender balance in their CS and engineering departments. Cal is still very boy-heavy, though L&S is a bit better than EECS.
For UCB L&S, you do need a 3.3 GPA in the prerequisite CS courses to enter the L&S CS major.
https://eecs.berkeley.edu/academics/undergraduate/cs-ba
Here are some career surveys for CS majors:
UCB: https://career.berkeley.edu/sites/default/files/pdf/Survey/2016CompSci.pdf
CMU: https://www.cmu.edu/career/documents/Stats_2016_updates/One%20Pager%202016-BS%20SCS%206-Month%20Update.pdf
USC: can anyone find it?
No school is perfect. They all have weaknesses, sometimes not apparent until you’re enrolled. Suffice it to say, you’d be fine at any of them.
Have you looked at the intangible things that might matter to you, like the surrounding community, weather, class sizes, etc?
you will be treated like GOLD as a USC Trustee scholar- small Honors Science classes and labs , lots of opportunities to do research, extra $$ for additional semester if you want it, vrs trying to learn in huge classes at UCB. USC has just finished building a fantastic new residential complex, where all honors students can live together.
Having Trustee Scholar- USC on your CV will open up thousands of doors ,especially in Calif, from the Trojan Alumni network.
And there is nothing nicer than walking to class in flip flops and shorts all year long.
Getting USC to PAY you to go to college there makes it the no-brainer choice.
What is the net price of each school for you?
@ucbalumnus All are out of state, I get full tuition at USC but I’m fortunate enough that money isn’t the largest factor for me
EDIT: I meant to say USC viterbi fellow (not viterbi scholar). Could anyone give their insight on if there are any benefits of that program (especially when it comes to recruiting) and in comparison to Cal & SCS as well? Thanks again!
You’re not even guaranteed to get into L&S CS at Cal - full tuition at USC in that comparison seems like a no-brainer.
If cost is not much of an issue and you don’t mind the weather or the hard work, I’d say that CMU SCS is by far the best CS program on your list. It’s in the top ~3 CS programs in the country along with MIT and Stanford.
USC has good recognition in SoCal, especially for it’s film programs. USC is probably about equivalent with UCLA for computer science.
The research and internships available at CMU are going to be a lot higher level than the ones at USC. And they are a lot more available at CMU than at Cal, because CMU has only about 600 CS undergrad CS majors and about 300 CS professors.