CSPP (MS in Computer Science) at U of C

Colleges and Universities A-Z University of Chicago ✅
1

<p>Hi does anyone have any experience with the MS in Computer Science program at U of C?</p>

<p>I was an accounting major, and I have worked for 3 years in audit, and I absolutely hate it. I'm interested in pursuing a career as a software developer.</p>

<p>I have 2 questions.</p>

<p>1- How selective is this program for non-CS majors?</p>

<p>2- Is this program sufficient in the sense that it can help me land a job as a software developer? I'm a little skeptical because it only requires 9 courses and doesn't require a BS in computer science for admissions.</p>

2

<p>Don’t know much about the master’s program. But the CS program (at least at undergrad level) at uchicago is not something to shout about. To be honest, most 2nd or 3rd tier state universities are better for CS education than uchicago. The department is very small for a university of its size, reputation and ranking. Apparently, most of the faculty members are crossovers from the math department and those who are not generally spend more time at Argonne or Fermilab.</p>

3

<p>^^ BS. Don’t comment on things you don’t know about.</p>

<p>UChicago’s CS department is oriented around theory, not practice. And as far as theoretical CS goes, UChicago is second to none. But yes, this means that industry-oriented people are going to be constantly complaining.</p>

<p>However, a few things. First of all, UChicago usually beats all of its Big 10 rivals (including Northwestern) in national programming competitions, and is the primary recruiting grounds for Google’s Chicago campus. Most UChicago CS grads go to top PhD programs or end up in senior positions at top companies after a few years. Believe it or not, UChicago is actually a very well-respected name for CS in the Chicago area by tech companies.</p>

<p>The truth is that the CS programs at most universities don’t teach the skills that companies want/need their employees to know. That’s why people with math/physics degrees can so easily enter the industry, and why software companies are always complaining about the lack of legitimate talent. UChicago’s emphasis on the theoretical aspects of CS actually serves as a strength rather than a weakness, since it endows students with something pathetically lacking in most CS programs: the mathematical ability to be successful in the industry.</p>

4

<p>To back up Phuriku, UChicago won the Mid-Central USA regional contest this past year: [Computer</a> programming team advances to World Finals again | UChicago News](<a href=“http://news.uchicago.edu/article/2012/11/21/computer-programming-team-advances-world-finals-again]Computer”>http://news.uchicago.edu/article/2012/11/21/computer-programming-team-advances-world-finals-again)</p>

5

<p>It is great that uchicago made it the World Finals but the performance in the regional contest doesn’t necessarily reflect the strength of CS department. From what I understand, one of students in the team that made it to the finals is a physics major. Besides, mid-central is a much weaker region compared to west or northeast. </p>

<p>I was merely expressing my opinions based on what I have observed. My son is a current student at uchicago majoring in CS and I am intimately familiar with the curriculum.</p>

6

<p>As someone with industry knowledge, companies that have a list of colleges that they recruit from for comp sci on recruiting trips and what not for sure don’t have chicago on its list, but if you have good work experience/internships what not and very good grades you can still make it through the normal recruiting channels.</p>

<p>With respect to practical/theoretical, you’ll have a lot of stuff to learn on the job but that’s true for anything. You really need to learn how to learn in comp sci since there’s too much to teach, and theoretical can help out with that.</p>

<p>Anyway, I’m actually gonna do comp sci at chicago which I picked over berkeley eecs since chicago started that 4 year joint program and shaving that year off getting a masters is worth it for me (also I can double major in something else which I’m interested in).</p>

<hr>

<p>This is the schedule I put together as a plan for 4 years @ Uchicago, and it’s the most applicable list of classes to today’s world. It includes bs classes too so ignore that if you want but the ‘best’ MS classes are there too.</p>

<p>Comp Sci Major (BS/MS) Joint</p>

<p>CMSC 16100 (Honors) Introduction to Computer Science I
CMSC 16200 (Honors) Introduction to Computer Science II
SMSC 15300 Foundations of Software
CMSC 15400 Introduction to Computer Systems</p>

<p>CMSC 23000 Operating Systems
CMSC 23300 Networks and Distributed Systems</p>

<p>CMSC 27100 Discrete Mathematics
CMSC 27200 Theory of Algorithms
CMSC 28000 Introduction to Formal Languages</p>

<p>CMSC 22200 Computer Architecture {MS overlap 1; course requirement}
CMSC 23300 Networks and Distributed Systems {MS overlap 2; core requirement}</p>

<p>3 Electives:
CMSC 33501 Topics in Databases
CMSC 25020 Computational Linguistics [or Biology!] {MS overlap 3; potentially approved course}
CMSC 22010 Digital Fabrication</p>

<p>MS Specific:</p>

<p>Course requirements -
Discrete Math (CMSC 27100)
Algorithms (CMSC 27200)
Machine Learning (CMSC 35400)
Operating Systems <a href=“CMSC%2023300”>permission required</a></p>

<p>Approved courses –
Mobile Computing (CMSC 33400)
Topics in Systems: Data Intensive Computing</p>

<p>Note: need good grades in 3 30,000+ graduate courses for honors.</p>

7

<p>There are actually several reputed universities with cross-over masters from non-cs undergraduates. Chicago is one, but Penn, JHU, Columbia, Stanford, Harvard, etc. all have their own variants with varying degrees of quality. None are particularly hard to get into. There are very popular with Big 4 alumni who want to get into analytics roles with blue chip organizations, but there will also be a lot of people with functionally useless UG degrees in the hard sciences like physics or pure math. Generally speaking, these strike me as high return on investment options for those in their mid-to-late twenties who have not really found any career traction in an area they like yet are worried they are lacking in marketable skills to make a transition. </p>

<p>In this light, although I would agree that Chicago is not tops in CS by any means, it makes more sense to go to a better name school generally. Admittedly, it will cost your more than a master’s at Purdue or Wisconsin or something like that, but long term benefits by way of professional signaling are definitely there as more and more CS jobs migrate out of formal IT departments and into general management and business operations type areas (which tend to be more status conscious about one’s academic pedigree in a broad sense).</p>