Full tuition scholarship or Purdue cs?

Colleges and Universities A-Z Purdue University
1

I’ve been award $7,000 Provost scholarship, $2,500 SICE scholarships, and I’m waiting to hear on Hutton Honors college scholarship(they said they average between $2-3k) at Indiana University. On the other hand, Purdue will be the full in-state cost of tuition for cs.

I like the campus of IU better but I have lived in btown my whole life. Part of me wants to leave but the money is good at IU. I love how many CS clubs are at Purdue and would want ot join the cs learning community.

I’ve also heard that Purdue is artificially hard for computer science, and I do not want to be weeded out of the computer science program.

2

Take the money. Live in the dorms and it will be the same as moving to another town. I went to school in Boulder with at least 10 ‘locals’ who lived in the sorority house and went ‘home’ about the same amount of time as those of us who lived farther away (basically never). They had the full college experience.

3

Do you have direct Admission to CS or are in FYE? Have you been offered the Bridge program or have extensive programming experience?
Is Purdue affordable without scholarships?

4

@MYOS1634 direct admission into computer science. I have a little bit of programming experience but if I go to Purdue, I will do Bridge because I don’t know much of Java

5

Direct admit is a big deal, congratulations!
Email to check that you can do Bridge.
Can your parents afford Purdue from income and savings?
Overall, there’s no bad choice - both are terrific.
My guess is that Purdue will be more of a change and will be more tech-y (which may or may not appeal). IU may be less brutal (although Purdue CS has developed a good support system - but the philosophy remains “you must prove to us that you deserve to be in our major”).
Considering your handle is ‘i want purdue’ it’s clear your heart tells you Purdue…

6

Follow ur heart my friend. I got accepted into Purdue CS as well and maybe I ll see u there

7

go to IU and then go to Purdue for masters with all the money you saved.

8

If you can afford Purdue, it’s pretty highly ranked for CS and may give you an advantage in finding a job afterwards. There’s a theory that you should NOT borrow for school more than you’d make your first year out of school. Not that you could pay it all back that first year, but that it’s a good standard to go by. My daughter also go admitted to Purdue for CS and their Honors program, but she got no scholarships or grants and we’re out of state. So there’s no way we can afford it. :frowning: It kills me that she got into such a great program and we can’t afford it. But hey, that’s life.

9

I can definitely afford it since I’m instate. I did not apply for honors, but that’s pretty sweet your daughter was accepted. What school will she attend? What made you like Purdue so much?

10

@alliblues

11

She liked Purdue because of it’s reputation and ranking of CS department. I like it because it’s kinda close to us in Kentucky. We hadn’t visited yet, but had planned to before we realized she hadn’t gotten any merit or financial aid. She still has five schools she’s waiting to hear from, but from the ones she’s heard from, she is leaning towards Northeastern in Boston. They gave her substantial merit scholarship money and grant aid. It’s a great school, so we’re very happy about it.

12

I had the exact same conundrum. Purdue offered me $0 while IU offered $13k. I chose IU over Purdue because of aid and ease of program. There are still many CS clubs at IU if you’re worried about that, though there are fewer and those that exist aren’t less active.

13

@adamint do you think you made the right decision? Just because IU is easier isn’t necessarily a good thing. I didn’t see any other CS clubs besides programmatik at IU

14

@iwantpurdue I do think I made the right decision, at least for myself. For what it’s worth, there ARE a lot more CS clubs at IU, like Code@IU and the CS club (which hosts competitions throughout the year). IU doesn’t seem to have the same involvement opportunities in CS outside of entrepreneurship as compared to Purdue, which is kind of a bummer, but they still do have opportunities (and I’m hoping to start a Competitive Programming club next year).

sidenote: Serve IT isn’t really a club, it’s an organization, but look it up if you want to learn in a project-based environment. That’ll teach you practical skills (such as Unix basics, DevOps, and working in TEAMS). I can’t tell you how many CS undergrads (at many schools, including Purdue) have no idea about proper code conventions, linting, continuous integration/development, and version control.

About the ease of the program, you’re taught what you need to know, and there is plenty of depth and breadth for those who want it. Look at IGPS for the current class list (or SICE website), it’s pretty amazing. I have a tentative schedule planned, and I’ll really enjoy the CS classes I’ll be able to take.

The vast majority of level programmers, from any university, come into companies as innocent newborns, blindly writing code. Beyond common languages and frameworks, companies will teach you the specific tools you’ll need to do your job well. I worked last summer with a recent IU CS Master’s graduate. Our company gave him time to broaden his skills to prepare him for his job.

If you want your learning based around functional tools and languages that you’ll be able to use right away in jobs, go to Purdue. IU’s CS curriculum is a lot more theoretical. There are pros and cons for each. I have a lot of experience programming, so I want to learn more of the theoretical (read: formal logic) side of CS. It really just depends on your outlook. Oh, plus the one year Master’s program more than makes up for the difference in starting salary between IU and Purdue grads (97k w/IU MSCS vs 83k w/Purdue BSCS)

I’m going to truncate this point because I don’t think you want to read an essay, but if you have more questions or concerns, let me know.

p.s. IU is a more well-rounded school. If you want to take language, informatics, art, design, business, or whatever classes, you’ll benefit from going there. If your only academic interest is CS (which is ok, though I would implore you to broaden your horizons), Purdue would probably be better for you.

15

sorry for the delayed response btw