Disappointed

Colleges and Universities A-Z Tufts University
1

Very disappointed in Tufts. Very large classes - as in hundreds of kids in a class. No contact with professors. Doesn’t even feel like the professors want to teach the classes - maybe because they are introductory classes.

The worst class is CompSci 11 (Intro to Computer Science). Hundreds of kids, the TAs are just other undergraduates - not even graduate students and they usually have no idea how to do the programming assignment. The professor is new to this class so I don’t think they have had these programming assignments.

So discouraging. I think the TAs at our public school are better than at Tufts. And undergraduates are teaching the labs!

Does anyone know of another place to find help??? I would even pay if that was required. But sort of horrifying after the amount of tuition paid.

2

I’m so sorry that things aren’t going well for you or your student. What else is on the schedule besides the intro CS course?

My older D graduated Tufts last spring in CS. The number of students in the major has exploded over the past few years, in part due to the exceptional and charismatic professor (Ben Hescott) who used to teach one of the CS intro courses. The department has been going through growing pains; I suspect that the combination of increased demand along with a lag in hiring new faculty to take up the demand is the major factor.

Yes, CS undergrads are the TAs during in the computer labs (D used to be one), and they usually work well because they had the programming assignments before and know what it’s like to be a clueless newbie :-). You’ve put your finger on the problem with new professor and new programming assignments. Either you (if you’re the student) or your student (if you’re the parent) should go talk to the professor about this and ask what can be done to help. Having the TA help is absolutely crucial, and if they aren’t able to help, the professor should be briefing the TAs on solutions.

For contact with professors, have you/has your student been going to office hours? I encouraged my D to be sure to do so throughout the semester so that she wouldn’t be a face in the crowd–she could go to get help, or she could go to comment that she found topic X especially important and wanted to know more about it, etc etc etc. Looking at RateMyProfessor or similar to see who gets high marks for being an engaging professor helps; depending on you/your student’s interests, look for some smaller courses for next semester. As students progress into a major, it’s easier to get to know the professors.

3

I am interested in whether other students are having a similar experience?

4

My son is a sophomore and his experience hasn’t been like that at all. He’s developed some close relationships with several of his professors, but he also goes to office hours and they may remember him bc he’s doing very well. His class sizes have ranged from 5 students (Italian and classics ) to one over 50 (intro psych). Most have been capped at around 20-25. He has had a couple grad student TAs but no undergrads yet, although my older son had undergrad TAs at brown and my neighbors’ son and daughter have had undergrad and grad TAs at Penn & umichigan. It’s probably likely that the only undergrads who don’t experience any TAs are those at LACs. My son has also developed a close relationship with his advisor, most likely because he took a class with her first semester freshman year and it had around 15 students, and involved writing a paper a week. He showed her a draft before submitting each final paper. She was incredibly kind to spend the time to really offer great feedback.

5

Two DDs at Tufts - each had maybe two classes with more than 50, most around 20 and each have had several with less than 10. Most TAs have been grad students, although I think they each had one class with undergrad TAs. Strong relationships with professors. Advisors, teachers, and research project directors. They often go to office hours, and have even been to professor’s homes for class related get-togethers. There is academic help available at Tufts in every subject and every class. However, the student has to go to the study sessions, sign up for tutors and go to office hours to get that help.

6

The OP hasn’t returned, so we unfortunately don’t have insight into what other departments have the large courses that the OP mentioned.

Talked to older D about this post. She agrees that the CS department is going through growing pains, and mentioned that students now need to declare the CS major before being able to take intro CS. I’d hope this will change once the department increases its ability to accommodate larger numbers of students. D arrived at Tufts intending to be an IR major (!) and had never programmed before taking the intro CS course. She’s now working at one of the Big Name Silicon Valley firms. I can think of no higher testimonial to the effectiveness and impact of the Tufts CS department.

7

3% classes 100+

8

I am always suspicious of someone who creates an account to complain about a school and it becomes a hit and run.

9

I thought the story made some sense. If the student is a freshman, it is not surprising that the classes are larger. That is especially true in CS where they seem to be short staffed. Also it is finals so the student may be under a lot of stress and more likely to feel negative about the school.

10

For the OP, if they are still around, there is a pace to go for help:

http://students.tufts.edu/academic-advice-and-support/academic-resource-center/what-we-offer/subject-tutoring

I had to find this for my Daughter this fall, who was overwhelmed by PHYS 11 having a minimal Physics background. And also an advisor who was not very knowledgeable or helpful.

It’s only first semester, but she has not experienced very large classes and/or TAs who don’t know what they are doing, but I have to say that this criticism has the ring of truth. Tufts is not a cozy East Coast LAC with small classes and strong Student-Professor relationships across the board. It is a mid size Research University with a President that is also quite Research oriented as far as I can tell.

My Daughter’s advisor does not have a very broad understanding of the college process- basically he can help you if you are in BME, but not much else it seems. This is probably coloring my feeling about the school right now.

11

@springsnow Have you taken the advice given to you here?

12

Hi @springsnow,

I am a Tufts Computer Engineering alum and my daughter just graduated from Tufts (with a non-STEM liberal arts degree). Two other family members are Tufts alums as well. Hopefully I can provide some insight/help.

On the insight side, Computer Science is pretty crazy right now, so try not to get frustrated. Computer Science departments across the country are having trouble keeping up with demand - especially those with strong CS programs.

The problem is twofold:

Due to economic conditions, demand for the major is exploding. Just this fall, CS surpassed IR as the most popular major at Tufts. Just a few years ago it was the 10th or 12th most popular major.

The bigger problem though, is that due to the proliferation of computers throughout society, an entry level course in CS is becoming a basic requirement for all college graduates. Looking at the enrollment numbers for CS11 (two classes of about 150 each semester) it appears that the percentage of undergrads taking CS11 is approaching 50%. This is despite the fact that course enrollment is limited to freshman, sophomores and majors.

Since qualified teachers are in short supply, the implication is that for every teaching slot dedicated to reducing the size of the introductory classes, there is the opportunity cost of giving up an advanced/leading edge course for students who are majoring in CS. It is these leading edge courses that attract leading edge companies and warrant leading edge salaries.

To provide some context:

Harvey Mudd, a liberal arts college with a strong CS department has an entry level CS class size of about 200 and a wait list of about 200 (from the other liberal arts colleges in Claremont “cluster”). The second level course has a class size of about 100. Undergrads are both tutors and graders.

Harvard has an entry level CS class size of about 700 which will soon surpass their largest class (Intro to Economics).
Class attendance is not required because the classes are videotaped. Undergrads are TA’s. The class is available online for free via EdX

Yale’s CS department has been struggling with the intro CS course problem for years and finally decided to give up and outsource their course to Harvard. Starting this year, Yale students (class size = 350) will watch the Harvard class streamed over the Internet. Undergrads are TA’s.

UC Berkeley’s intro CS course has a class size of 900+.

What you can do:

Again, try not to get frustrated. CS11 is a lot of work. It is a challenging, but doable course - especially if one has not been exposed to programming or logical problem solving before. It uses a systems programming language and it is the exact same course that aspiring computer engineers take. The payoff is that it will not only give you a valuable skill, but it will improve your general problem solving skills as well as give you a better understanding of what can and cannot be done with computer technology.

As suggested, go to the professor. Don’t assume he doesn’t care, he does. His name is Chris Gregg and he has a 3.6 rating on ratemyprofessors.com, second only to Hescott (who used to teach the course and won a rare international teaching award from the IEEE Computer Society). His title is lecturer, which means he gets paid to teach, not do research. This is his first year teaching the intro course (in the past, he taught the second level course, and it looks like they flipped the entry and second level roles this year). It is possible he changed the programming assignments and some TA’s could be challenged by them. If that is the case he would want to know about it, and he can help with solutions. There are lots of sections and students can switch sections.

As suggested, free subject tutoring is available to anyone. You are paying for it, so don’t think twice about using it.
http://students.tufts.edu/academic-advice-and-support/academic-resource-center/what-we-offer/subject-tutoring

Remember that engineering is a team sport. Don’t try to go it alone. Form workgroups. Seek out classmates who seem to know what they are doing. Engineers are usually very willing to help. A fellow Tufts alum who is a doctor told me he never would have made it through some of his premed courses without the help of friends who were engineers. Hang out in the EE/CS building to do homework/projects.

There is also an online tool to encourage questions/discussion about the course. This tool is used by many CS departments:
https://piazza.com/tufts/Fall2015/comp11

If you are a CS or engineering major, then there are lots of clubs/professional societies you can join to get to know upperclassman and graduate students. There is also a formal mentoring program you can join
https://www.facebook.com/tuftsengineeringmentors

If you are a woman (or even if you are not) then look into joining the student chapter of the Society for Women Engineers - it is very active and open to non engineers.
http://ase.tufts.edu/swe/
http://ase.tufts.edu/swe/#/about
http://ase.tufts.edu/swe/#/board

Good Luck!

13

@ormdad

For a perspective beyond the department of her freshman advisor, send your daughter to her Academic Dean - Jason Rife.

http://students.tufts.edu/academic-advice-and-support/academic-advising/meet-your-advising-team#Associate Deans

Freshman year is sort of a scouting year, relationships tend to start developing in the second year as students start to specialize.

Once your daughter has decided on a major, she will get a new advisor from that department/program. Given that your daughter already has an area of interest, and it happens to be interdisciplinary, I would recommend she start “shopping” for an advisor by looking through the bios of the people associated with that program and see what interests her. I would guess that the people from the Computer Science Department that are also affiliated with the Cognitive Science Program might be the best fit, but meeting people from the “softer” side of the discipline (Psych, Philosophy and Child Development) could be beneficial as well.

Some of the new CS people associated with AI/machine learning will not be listed below, but they would also be appropriate.

You might want to explain to her that everyone is going to come at the field from a different perspective rooted in their area of expertise. No perspective is wrong, but one or more may resonate with her more than the others. Being exposed to multiple perspectives is an important advantage of interdisciplinary study, but it can be confusing at first.

Now that I know what department her current advisor is from, one of your earlier posts makes more sense. I had been assuming her advisor was from the CS department…

The top people in the Cog Science program:
http://cogsci.tufts.edu/people/

The people who designed the program (note that this is an older document, but it has more names)
http://www.cs.tufts.edu/~couch/soecc/2007-03-07/cogsci.pdf

14

Thanks @Mastatdon, I will pass this information along. And thanks again for your input in the past!

FYI SWE is one of the reasons she is staying in Eng- apparently you cannot be in SWE if you are a CS major in A&S.

15

4.6 not 3.6 for Chris Gregg @Mastadon

16

@greensak - Good catch!

Transcription mistake on my part, but it makes a big difference!

I must have been subliminally thinking a 4.0 vs 5.0 scale…

In any event, my intent was to say he is one of the most liked professors, but I guess I kind of blew it …

17

@ormdad-

I found this on Quora - might be of interest to your daughter

https://www.quora.com/What-are-the-must-take-classes-within-the-Cognitive-and-brain-science-major-at-Tufts

18

@Mastadon You make some good points but I am always suspicious when people begin trashing Harvard or MIT or Berkeley. Tufts is a great university but trying to pretend that Harvard or Princeton don’t have awesome resources is just not credible.

19

@brexit99 - Stating the intro class sizes at Harvard and Berkeley is far from “trashing” them. They are both top research universities. A research university’s reputation is built on the impact of their research - not on the size of their introductory classes. Since the top CS students tend to skip the intro class and every teaching slot that is dedicated to an intro class means that an additional advanced class can’t be taught, or additional research can’t be performed, some CS professors would argue that small introductory classes actually weaken the department. They tend to make this argument even more if the introductory classes are full of students who don’t even intend to major in CS.

I didn’t say anything about MIT, but it is different type of animal. Because it is a technical institute, it has always had a high percentage of students taking CS classes, so they have not seen as big of a change in demand as schools with a large liberal arts population.

In terms of resources, schools tend to deploy them based on their priorities. A pure LAC (like Williams) and a pure research university (like Harvard or Yale) are going to make different tradeoffs in deploying their resources. Tufts is a hybrid. Call it a “research LAC” or a “teaching university”, but it is going to make its own set of tradeoffs based on its own priorities.

The other thing to remember is that universities with the largest endowments were the hardest hit by the “great recession” - because they were more dependent on their endowments to cover operating expenses. It is harder to argue that you should expand your CS department when you are running an operating deficit - the priority has to be cutting expenses and rebuilding the endowment to the point where it can generate enough income to support the existing expenses.