Hello there,
I’m reentry non tranditional student.
I got accepted to CSUN, CAL Poly, and UC Davis for this fall.
I got in as Finance program in CSUN, CIT in CAL Poly, and Managerial Economics in UC Daivs,
but I want to take more courses and get into CS program.
I’m taking intro C programing class this fall and Also a math class to review.
Part of me want to go to UC Davis, because it’s UC. and It’s close to the silicon Valley, but honestly, I won’t mind keep living in L.A. I like that I won’t have to deal with traffic, but I’m worried that UC program is geared towards Post doc and the profs wont care about the teaching as much as research.
CSUN was my target school when I was applying everywhere, but that’s when my major was in CIS,Accounting and Finance sector… I’m not sure How good CS program is in CSUN.
If you are current or previous student at Davis, Would you please share with me your thoughts on …
UC DAVIS… school it self
CS program.
Teaching Quality.
Internship Oppotunity living in Davis.
Changing major as Transfer Student.
Etc??
Thank you so much for your time.
Most professors do genuinely care about their students, but with the class sizes it’s up to the students to actually talk to them and see that. If big classes are a problem for you, I wouldn’t recommend Davis for CS. Likewise, the program is pretty good. The biggest downside is the class sizes.
As for Davis itself, one big thing here is that the campus environment is very friendly and cooperative. There’s competition, but it’s a more friendly competition as opposed to cutthroat competition. The other thing is the bikes, which has its good and bad. Good because the campus and town is very bike friendly, so you can get your exercise and don’t really need a car. Bad because a lot of times you’re dealing with people who don’t have much experience on a bike and quite clearly don’t know what they’re doing. This is particularly obvious at the beginning of each year, and I would recommend not biking the first couple weeks of fall because of that.
A lot of companies recruit at Davis. We’ve had Apple, Microsoft, Sony, Intel, HP, and several other smaller companies at our past few career fairs.
Changing your major is really easy. CS is impacted, so you need to fulfill the prereqs and then fill out the change of major form. The prereqs are listed here: http://www.cs.ucdavis.edu/undergraduate/cs-major/change-of-major/ . You’re already taking intro to programming, which would cover ECS 30 at least. You can easily fit in ECS 40, ECS 20, MAT 21A (if needed) and MAT 21B (again, if needed) in two quarters. One quarter if you’ve already completed one or both calculus classes. From there you just fill out the change of major forms and you’ll be switched.