Currently at University of Colorado Boulder thinking about transferring to UMD, UVA.....

Given the choice would it better in the long run (ROI, job/company placement, knowledge skills, choice of grad school) to graduate from UC Boulder in 2 years or transfer to a higher ranked undergrad program such as UMD, UVA, GTECH but graduate in 3 to 4 years, with the intent to still pursue a masters. I guess the question is do I have a better chance of getting into a better masters program or the big four software companies if I decide to switch to a more well known CS school but not top tier (Stanford, MIT, Carnegie mellon, Berkeley). Does the choice of undergrad school matter all that much if the intent is an eventual Master’s degree? Is it worth the 2 more years of additional schooling considering the CS Boulder program is fast tracked and I only take the core CS classes?

What’s the goal with the masters? Undergrad will not matter for that, so if that is indeed the path, it’s absolutely not worth transferring.

If you go straight into industry it’s probably also not worth it, as companies hire much more on skill/interviewing than based on name brands. Plenty of top companies hire UC Boulder grads, you can verify that via Linkedin. And UVA for example has no “better” CS reputation than where you are now even. There’s a small case for UMD/GT but again the difference isn’t night and day.

What does this mean exactly?