I’m interested in opinions on good computer science schools in the US where undergrad enrollment might range from say 2K-10K students. Schools need to be located in a major urban city, no rural destinations. While there are a lot of online resources that love to rate the elite Comp Sci universities, most of us won’t quality for admission to these schools. While some of the large state flagship universities seem to have solid CS programs, I’m not really interested in attending a university with 20K+ students. While I like the premise of liberal arts college, they’re often located in a smaller community and/or don’t have a comprehensive CS program with a broad base course offering. As such, I’m really drawn to mid sized universities for now, but need feedback as to where and department quality. Any opinions welcomed. Has anyone else looked into this or reached any conclusions? If so please share. Thanks,
How big a city?
Cost constraints and state of residency?
Other threads indicate that you are a transfer student. Current school, course work, and grades?
I currently live in the Midwest and will transfer from a community college with AA in Computer Science. My computer skill level is a 9 on a 1-10 scale, (compared to people of my age).I decided on two years at Community College due to cost and desire to limit loans. Parents contribute to school cost and I also anticipate getting decent need based aid at private schools. .I’ll likely leave CC with a 3.5 or so, but have all A’s in computer courses.
City size of one million or more and leaning to something in the western US.
UT Austin
Enrollment at UT Austin is way past 20k but the program is top ten
As much as I don’t wanna break it to you, you should attend your top state flagship then.
You claim to go to a “good mid sized none lite comp sci school”. Well if you care about your future, I do recommend you not to do this.
This means = More limited job fairs, harder to get a better job you want, etc. etc. (and you pay more)
That said, Carleton, Harvey Mudd are the only ones I can think of for your criteria.
Harvey Mudd though is pretty much level “Impossible” for transfers (arguably harder than MIT so lets skip that altogether)
Carleton I’m a bit ehh about.
Oh ya, and Vanderbilt. Vanderbilt is incredibly friendly with transfers (really really high transfer rate for its prestige) and I think they have a non loan policy or something similar for low income. Go take a shot in Vanderbilt at least. I’m gonna bet they will most likely have the biggest financial aid of all your apps if you can get in and I think the chances are like 1/3 unlike its peer schools like Brown and Rice which are like 1/13… <= and from my knowledge, CS students from Vanderbilt get incredible job offers (remember, it’s a more undergrad focused school so grad school ranking isn’t everything and it’s decently sized in an epic college town!)
Frankly though, as much as I hate to admit, to brighten the possibilities of your future as much as possible, I really recommend either:
- the best “prestigious” school you can get into without breaking your bank
- the best college in your state (state flagship)
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Sum up: Pretty much the best school in your area will maximize possibilities. If you attend a very expensive private school due to the “medium sized” when it is regarded less of a quality than the state flagship of that place, then your prospects aren’t going to be that great. (No offense to those attending these colleges. I have huge respect for the liberal arts college but with colleges souring like $$$ even with financial aid…)
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Mudd takes 1-2 transfers per year. Honestly, a 3.5 CC student won’t get in there.
Ya, I did claim it is level “Impossible”. It’s much easier to go transfer to Stanford, MIT, or Harvard then there
But it really is a great school ^^
Anyways, like I said, try Vanderbilt.
You never know your luck (and I’m being legit serious. It’s a transfer friendly place that is very prestigious and places incredibly well for grad school)
Thanks to those that have posted so far. Just to reiterate, if you Google top computer science schools and find results similar to the links below, odds are strong that I’m not a candidate for any of these. (Too competitive or too large for my preference). If a school has an admit rate of <50%, getting in would be very challenging. What I’m after is the next tier of schools, and as mentioned in the initial post, those with a smaller enrollment and located in a major metro area.
These schools may be fantastic, but will not be good candidates for most:
http://www.computersciencedegreehub.com/50-innovative-computer-science-departments/
@hackerman1996 You may not be giving yourself enough credit. I’m a California CC transfer student with a 3.49 GPA and was accepted to UC Irvine, #24 on your first link and #29 CS on USnews. With a 3.5 GPA as a transfer, you have a decent chance at schools that are #25 and higher. Now, UCI and none of the UC’s are the size you’re looking for. I will say that finding a 2k-10k school in an urban area is unlikely unless it’s A) not a good school, or B) prestigious. Ideally, you should attend your state’s top school, or second top school if it is in the 2k-10k undergrad range. You’ll get into a cheaper, higher ranked school compared to applying elsewhere.
But with 2k-10k undergrad, urban, good CS school, and not top #25 in mind…
You can possibly try U of Chicago (5k undergrad, #34 CS, but hard to get into b/c overall prestige)
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (aka RPI, 5k undergrad, #52 CS, but not too urban i think)
or Drexel University (undergrad depends on location, #90 CS)
The main problem with the criteria is that they are always contradicting. I don’t know too much about which areas all across the US are urban, but these are the only 3 I could find in the top #100 cs schools.
A small population, good CS school will be too prestigious or not urban.
A mid-prestige, urban school will not be good CS or have a huge undergrad.
A good CS school, mid-prestige will not be urban or have a huge undergrad.
So on and so forth.
The University of California system, while reportedly accepting an increased number out of state students, favors families who are prepared to pay the full out-of-state tuition amount. While that number can still be less than attending a competitive private university, the state of CA won’t be forthcoming with financial aid, or so says the counselor at my current school. As a result, the net cost to attend will likely be higher than other options.The UC system would rather accept a full payer from China than me who is looking for aid. Also, they do hold out-of-state students to strict academic requirements.
I’m sure there are some schools out there with a strong CS program and a good undergrad teaching experience that are not the true CS elite schools. That’s what I’m after.
@hackerman1996
First, I want to let you know that just because a college is small does not in any way correlate with “good undergrad teaching”. From my experience, it is mostly the professors that teach your course that makes or breaks the “good undergrad teaching”. And as much as I hate to admit, most community colleges (probably like yours) teach “better” than most universities (and liberal art colleges).
Anyways, as we all know, OOS schools pretty much never give financial aid. I think we should all accept that hard cold fact. I’m sure they do on some cases but the purpose of state schools is to serve its students from state first, not those from other states.
So we are stuck with 2 options. Either go attend your flagship OR attend a decent private.
Now, I don’t know your state so it is possible that your flagship might uhmm… not be the best (reason being you are avoiding your flagship)
However, if that is not the case, then I do say please reconsider a bit.
Anyways, your criteria is kind of hard.
“Good undergrad teaching” + “Strong CS program” + “not true CS elite schools”
Well, as you consider “good undergrad teaching” as colleges with 2~10k students, that already limits the colleges to mostly small universities or liberal art colleges.
“Strong CS programs”. Now this is a key word that you shouldn’t overlook. Strong CS programs in universities are USUALLY all crowded as CS is currently the mega-ultra-hype (no jokes). And liberal art colleges with strong CS programs are like… Williams, Harvey Mudd, Swathmore, etc. (the type that is hard to get in)
And this part is the biggest challenge to finding your list. “not true CS elite schools”. This criteria will actually give you a “disadvantage” your first 10 years out of college. Sure they say college name doesn’t matter and all that BUT your college will be your “stepping stone” to your career. There are reasons why people are desperate to go to prestigious colleges. It’s not the education that sets them apart but the name on the diploma as it opens doors…
That said, here is my list for you:
- Vanderbilt (like I said, please do at least send an application. You never know and out of all your acceptances, it will most likely be the most affordable in the privates if you could get in. And the acceptance rate is more of 1/3 so hey, who knows?.. The difference between winners and losers is that winners take risks. Go be a winner and hey, even if you get declined, at least you won’t have that “what if” moment)
- Your state flagship (ofc as what would happen if your financial aids are horrible and all loans!?! or just horrible. Even my university that touts as the 4th best financial aid system (Columbia University in City of NY) had a disappointing financial aid so… it’s completely norrmal)
- Renneselaer Poltechnic Institute (i think it kinda meets your criteria although it’s not liberal art focused at all -.-)
- Worcester Polytechnic Institute or Rose Hulman or University of Southern California (all pretty much have similar acceptance rate though USC has a bit more competitive pool of applicants -depends on how daring you want to do be if you feel safe with your flagship- and I would say Rose Hulman is bit better than Worcester)
That said, I really really really would like to accentuate that your school name matters.
You might think right now the best place for your “education” is best. However, the real world doesn’t work like that. It’s possible that a place like UMass-Amherst (great CS program btw) teaches better than Stanford at CS. But just because of the Stanford name, there will usually be more doors open for students for the first 10 years of their career.
So please, try not to keep thinking of attending a “non elite CS school” that is “small and intimate”
The first serves a disadvantage in your career.
The latter with the first pretty much warrants a college with very little career fairs for your major, etc.
Your life would be in a more advantageous position attending a state flagship than a school that is non elite and small (which not many have heard of). And you will be paying a boat load of money attending a private -and the lesser known privates barely give financial aid. In fact, the USNews is pretty much a ranking for financial aid system for privates. So, if the private is not as well known…I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s all loans-
Anyways, there is also Case Western Reserve University, Macalester.
And unfortunately, as much as I hate to break it to you, liberal art colleges are usually MUCH harder to get into as a transfer student than more known private research universities. You actually have more chances to going like USC or Vanderbilt than some of the liberal art college peers like Claremont McKenna, Carleton, Macalester, etc. etc. So if you really think you can get into those kind of schools but not USC or Vanderbilt, I’m sorry to break it to you but some of those schools are MUCH harder to get in for transfer -because of the school’s size limitations-…
Liberal art colleges don’t accept much transfer students in general. So ya,…
I totally disagree with AccCreate about what kind of school to attend. There isn’t much to differentiate most CS programs, and going to a non-elite CS school is perfectly fine. That’s where most programmers come from.
For CS, you get hired based on what you know, not where you went to school.
Here in the SF Bay Area, Santa Clara University, University of San Francisco, Cal State East Bay or St. Mary’s might work for you. In Southern California you have Loyola Marymount, Chapman University, University of San Diego, University of Redlands. Up north are University of Portland and Seattle University. These are just the schools off the top of my head.
(my view -do take in fact that I am a bit pessimistic person-)
- We don’t even know which state is his in-state.
- Seeing he is mentioning financial aid implies that he is not that affluent to toss up a large chunk of money (even with financial aid) and this is completely normal because the tuition in the States right now are outrageous -don’t forget, the rest of the world (most) have very very low tuition (a couple thousand a year) or no tuition at all-
If you look at financial aid numbers at places like Santa Clara University, many students are not fully met and those that are are typically assigned loans as part of their “financial aid”.
I don’t consider loans as a “financial aid”. Maybe others will have differing views from me but my perspective of loans is avoid it entirely if possible. Many of the schools you had listed include some heavy loans on their financial aid packages or do not meet full aid for all students.
And I don’t really see the big advantage of attending those schools over a flagship. Sure it’s great to be near SF Bay Area (or at it) because it would give you a tremendous boost in getting job offers at the place. However, is it really worth the loans and the possibility of aid not being fully met? At least for me, almost all the time, I would take my own state’s flagship over a university that requests for loans and may not meet full aid.
Also, state universities are known to have systems like honors college. You get the intimate settings in such systems while having a state university’s greatest advantage (lots of resources).
To the thread starter:
However, do note at the end of the day, it is you who are picking your transfer college.
In addition, the location of your college will indirectly determine the location of your first job. For instance, if you were to attend a school in Texas, then most likely, after graduation you will be working in Texas. The like holds true for simba’s recommendation of the SF Bay Area schools.
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I know I am a bit pessimistic but I really do wish you chose your transfer colleges carefully. I do not suggest loans or schools that take advantage of loans as a "financial aid" in their policy [there are rare cases in which loans are the right thing to do but I can't really see the worth of extra pay with the addition of some privates not even meeting full aid to some students (this can mean lesser financial aid for transfer students)] <= You really should be avoiding the more expensive privates in which they consider a notable part of the financial aid in loans. Sure, fit is great. In fact, I'm all for fit BUT taking loans (?) to do so? I'm a bit hesitant there. And state flagships are not bad choices. It is pretty intimate if you take advantage of it...
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I would not recommend St. Mary’s of California for a prospective CS major, when it offers only four regular CS courses (plus special topics and special study courses): https://www.stmarys-ca.edu/math-and-computer-science/cs-course-descriptions
I agree that non-elite is usually fine, as long as there are sufficient CS offerings at the school to make attending it as a CS major worthwhile. But the other points raised about the OP’s criteria do make it difficult to find schools:
- Smaller schools are more likely to have smaller CS departments with insufficient offerings, or offer many of their courses infrequently.
- Smaller schools may have fewer places for transfer students.
- Many smaller schools are in rural locations.
- Non-elite schools are less likely to have good financial aid, and merit scholarships are harder to come by for transfers.
I would recommend that the OP reprioritize the search with the following as the top criteria for the schools:
- Will admit the OP as a transfer to the CS major.
- Will be affordable based on cost and financial aid (check net price calculators).
- Has a CS department with sufficient offerings.
Anything else, such as urban location, smaller size, etc. would be a bonus.
The majority of US colleges and universities, large and small, offer a CS major and each one likely believes they do a reasonable job. If you’d talk to the professors at any school in America who are teaching CS, most would be obligated to promote the quality and strength of their department and the school in general. From the student’s prospective, we can’t rely on the accuracy of what we hear and instead focus on gut feelings, school “rankings” and also by looking at sites like ratemyprofessor.com. Yes there is something to be gained by seeing what other students have indicated regarding satisfaction with the faculty in a particular department. While ratemyprofessor can be harsh and also a popularity contest, it does offer some insights. For example, if the vast majority of CS professors at a particular school receive unfavorable reviews for poor teaching quality, wouldn’t most students be at least somewhat less inclined to attend? I would.
The smaller private universities I’ve identified so far are generally quality institutions and not third tier type schools as ranked by US News. Whether the school’s CS department is solid is unknown. How I would correctly ascertain this is really a mystery. I do agree with the earlier reply that a school’s location is of consequence should I wish to remain in the city post graduation. Would living in St. Louis, Pittsburgh or Indianapolis serve me as well as residing in a high tech market that might boast better internships and post grad opportunities? This is a big issue. As mentioned earlier, I really favor a western US location. Below are some of the schools under consideration. All have fewer than 10K undergrads. Whether the CS program is reasonable and would provide a good outcome is unknown. Equally important is that the school needs to be affordable to us after financial aid.
WESTERN US
University of Denver-CO
Seattle University-WA
University of Portland-OR
Santa Clara University-CA
Pacific Lutheran University-WA
University of San Diego-CA
OTHERS
Loyola University-IL
Duquesne University-PA
St. Louis University-MO
Butler University-IN
Villanova University-PA
Trinity University-TX
If anyone wants to comment on these schools, please share. Thanks to anyone who has posted so far.
Tufts has smaller program but it’s not easy to get in. It’s not MIT but very solid.
I like Santa Clara in your Western list and Trinity in Texas. But more familiar with Santa Clara.
Yes, all these preferences have to go out the window with affordability. How much can OP pay, how much aid is OP eligible for if he is able to get any as a transfer. Also large school shouldn’t really matter too much in upper division coursework, there is naturally a smaller cohort in your dept. Who cares if there are large intro classes in Econ etc if you are entering as a Jr.