Does anyone want to apply for cs in Wisconsin? How do you feel about the prospect of this major in Wisconsin?
“Prospect of this major”? If you mean being competitive nationally- yes. Of course helpful for WI based jobs. Son added CS to his UW honors math major- did well. Strong departments. Plus an excellent overall college experience.
US News ranks UW above some Ivy league schools for Comp Sci. I have a freshman considering declaring a comp sci major and currently taking freshman cs classes. Just be prepared to work hard when you get to campus to be successful. You just need to be accepted to L&S to start CS. Plenty of students start down that path and aren’t successful.
Big and better changes underway. https://news.wisc.edu/new-uw-madison-school-sets-emphasis-on-computing-data-fields/
My DC is admitted to CS in L&S. We received a email asking us to take a placement test. Does anyone know about this? Also Is it compulsory for everyone who gets admitted to CS or do they pick and choose.
Placement tests are required of all admitted UW freshmen- regardless of their school/college/major. The two required ones have always been math (precalc) and English. Optional are foreign languages ones. These are for placement purposes- most will place out of remedial classes needed to satisfy university graduation requirements. Some high scores will allow taking of more advanced classes than the usual student is eligible for. AP exams do not replace this (unless they have revised the math requirement).
The foreign language tests are for placement in a UW language class level- regardless of background/years of the language studied. They are only useful to students planning to take that language at UW. Some elect to take them and the UW class to get retroactive college credits for work done previously. They are not needed to meet the university (can differ for different colleges/schools) graduation requirements if the numbers of HS (including middle school) years meet those for the degree (BA and BS differ in L&S). Completing (passing) four years of one language (or 3 plus 2 of a second one) for a BA or three of a single one in HS suffice. No specific grades received matter. One reason I always tell students to try to finish a fourth level of a foreign language in HS to free up time for other college classes and be able to get any BA/BS degree.
Placement tests are now usually done well before SOAR (summer orientation and registration). Students should look at what is covered and review as needed- sometimes after higher math levels one forgets the basics. It would be a shame to place into a remdial class because too much time has passed since basic knowledge was learned and then forgotten. One of those “get it over with” tasks for students. Check the UW website for details.
btw- in L&S you get your BA or BS based on meeting the respective requirements, not your major. A STEM major will likely meet BS reqs but adding some more social science and humanities courses will alllow a BA- reverse for a BS in nonSTEM fields. Some other schools/colleges may only offer the BS and have different graduation requirements along with those required of all UW graduates.
So much of this becomes clear for students once they are on campus. Every institution will have its graduation requirements for all students and those more specific ones. UW is delightful in its flexibility- both for degree and majors. Even though students technically need to declare a major to take certain courses that can be flexible in practice and the major declaration needs to be stated weeks or more before graduation.
This knowledge gained from my and son’s experiences. I also know that professors care about individual students and help them with working out logistics in taking courses.