So overall brand name weight, opportunities, environment, cost, gpa cutoff issue, Etc. you would recommend UT? @Rivet2000
@bopper will take those questions into consideration. I would probably choose berkeley if it weren’t for the grade issue and super high cost.
Most kids have to take cost into consideration. You would not be alone in that.
If your dad is fine with spending a lot more money for not much better, why not choose CMU?
I won’t say brand name and rigor don’t matter in CS, but UT-Austin is already among the elite schools in CS, so the difference between UT-Austin and somewhere you can go for free is bigger than the difference between UT-Austin and Cal or CMU.
@PurpleTitan CMU just did not feel right when I visited 
. If UT is pretty much the same overall in quality as Cal/CMU then I will 100% pick UT.
Ask your dad to give you the extra money he would have paid for Cal and invest it.
@PurpleTitan Ok. Hello S&P 500. But srsly just to make sure, UT is pretty much minimal diff with Cal in terms of resources, quality of education, etc. right
I haven’t been to UT-Austin. But I have been to a number of top-ranked schools including Rice< MIT, Harvard and CMU, and quite frankly (and I don’t mean to offend anyone on here), none of them compares to Berkeley. I think the only school that ALMOST matches Berkeley in this regard is MIT. And, I think the only school that tops Berkeley in this regard is Stanford. But even saying this to you now is giving me some doubts, because the startup culture at Cal now is really, really strong, and there’s many, many people there (students, faculty, staff and alumni) who are ACTIVELY involved in doing it now. And, I guess it becomes even more prevalent now due largely to the influx of venture capitalists (mostly wealthy alumni) expressing strong desire to fund the startups founded by anyone who has links to Berkeley. Mind you, there are Cal, there are alumni who ACTIVELY go around the campus with the sole purpose of providing free consultancy works and mentor-ship. THEY ARE DOING IT ON A DAILY BASIS! There presence alone will encourage even those students and faculty who weren’t into entrepreneurship in the beginning. These same people will then hook you up with alumni who will then help you with funding. So, money will not restrict Berkeley students from doing it now in as much as it probably does many years ago. Aside from Stanford, I’m not sure if there’s any school like it. Maybe UT-Austin. I’m not sure. But my guess is it’s not as vibrant as at Berkeley’s and Stanford’s.
@sorashiro “As for UIUC/GT they are pretty much similar to UT …”
Wha GT? Similar in what way?
Berkeley, UT, UIUC are virtually identical schools 40k+ students ~35% stem.
GT is more like MIT, RPI, CMU than it is similar to UT.
GT is 80% stem and half the size (15k ugrad) of the other schools… it’s also in a city.
I still think you should choose UT… but GT is “similar to UT”? Not even close. You couldn’t find 2 more different Div1 schools than GT and UT.
If you sort the schools by SAT
CMU,GT,UCB,UIUC,UT
Almost all those M.E.T. students turned down one or two of HYPSM to attend the program. From one of the students in the inaugural class: 17 of those 40 M.E.T. students turned down Stanford for it. All of those who made it onto the MET program and into MIT chose MET over MIT. But there were only 9 of them. The admit rate was only 2.5% last year. It was even slimmer this year. 40% of the class are in-state.
http://www.businessinsider.com/uc-berkeley-met-for-future-tech-leaders-2017-4
I think some posters on here are on here just to intimidate you.
@sorashiro : You shouldn’t worry about getting a 3.3 for your Berkeley CS classes. It’s true, Berkeley classes are generally more competitive than those at other schools. But 3.3 isn’t impossible. And, it’s not even difficult for those who love it. if you’re cut for CS, it would just be a breeze for you. CS students are generally helpful. You and your classmates to be will be helping each other out, not just to raise your grades up, but to make sure you’ll learn a lot, something that you would be needing for you higher major subjects.
Berkeley CS profs themselves said this: Students who couldn’t hack a 3.3 on Berkeley CS classes are not cut for CS, and most likely, wouldn’t thrive as a CS student anywhere. And, I believe them.
Regardless of whether or not that is true (probably not, since a B (3.0) grade is supposed to be a good grade), the reason that there are GPA minimums to declare the L&S CS major is that the department has limited capacity. Back when there was less interest in CS (after the tech bubble crash of the early 2000s), L&S CS at UCB admitted students who had a 2.0 GPA in the prerequisite courses. Several years ago, the minimum GPA was raised to 3.0 because the number of students was about to grow beyond the department’s capacity. More recently, it was raised to 3.3 for the same reason.
The UCB class of 2017 had 557 L&S CS majors graduating, along with 401 EECS majors, most of whom emphasized CS (based on the small size of upper division EE courses).
@greymeer, you can’t sort SAT between CMU, GT and UCB, UIUC, UT this way. UCB, UIUC and UT are huge comprehensive universities, so there are a lot of non-STEM students with lower scores; while CMU and GT have much higher percentage of STEM students. To be fair, you need to compare the CS+Engineering stats across the schools. I have no data, but if I have to guess, it will be pretty close among these schools.
@ucbalumnus : Sure, the law of supply and demand had some bearing on Cal’s CS capping history. But that is true anywhere. What do you think will Harvard, for instance, do if 80% of its students will suddenly major in CS??? Harvard would regulate its CS program. I think it’s what Berkeley did. But my understanding is, Berkeley CS carefully studied the chronicle of its cut-off grade policies by looking into the students performances before coming up a 3.3 cut-off now. Those students that were admitted with a 2.0 - 3.0 were the same students who eventually dropped-out or struggled during their junior and senior years. So, the 3.3 wasn’t just because Berkeley had to regulate due to funding issues, but also to make sure they’re getting the RIGHT students who really love the program.
If you’re going to major CS for the money, you’ll find CS studying burdensome and you’re most likely would be counting the number of hours spent on studying and reviewing. You’re one of those students who complain and gloat. But for those who love CS, you surely wouldn’t find it that way. You’ll wake up every morning full of excitement to go to class, sit down with your fellow classmates and discuss about what you’ve just been lectured on and/or share ideas on how or what you can come up with that is useful to society (which often is the start of your startups).
Fact is, only top CA students get into Berkeley. The tippy top get in for CS. Half of them don’t make it.
Berkeley is indeed one of the best engineering schools in the world. Research work, faculty, peer group, you name any, it is one of the best. If you are an international student planning to go back to your home country, esp. Asia, the Berkeley name will open doors everyewhere. Otherwise, at the end of the 4 year, both Berkeley and UT will give you the opportunity to work for a top end IT company or allow you to do Ph.D in places like MIT, Stanford. Very mundane thought! Yes, we all look for leveraging our college education for a successful career.
@MYOS1634:
“Fact is, only top CA students get into Berkeley. The tippy top get in for CS. Half of them don’t make it.”
Well, the first and last parts are true. But while EECS admits by major, Cal L&S doesn’t which is why CS there is competitive entry.
Regardless, paying a lot more for an uncertain shot when you have a much cheaper guaranteed option that’s almost as good doesn’t make much sense.
@bogeyorpar I agree with you but this is how people compare elite schools with 6k students or less students to public schools 20k+.
I was getting ready to post with the following opening line: “The choice between UT and Cal is complicated. Now, if the choice was between Cal and schools like Stanford, MIT, or CMU the choice would be much clearer.” Then I saw post that said you were accepted into CMU SCS. Now I’m trying to wrap my head around your discounting CMU from your acceptance process. Why?
@Rivet2000 I just did not like CMU when I visited. The whole place seemed very depressing.