My kid got into UCLA CS and Engineering and Harvey Mudd. Money aside, which one is better and why?
Harvey Mudd. You’re basically guaranteed a job out of college, have plenty of research opportunities, will receive plenty of attention from teachers, and even though the academics are tough, it’s worth it. If your kid is willing to put in the work at Harvey Mudd, and money isn’t a problem, I say go for it.
The problem is that my kid doesn’t like humanities and they are humanities heavy.
Their emphasis on balance is one reason for the benefits that thisisfine2020 lists. That’s a choice your kiddo is going to have to make. More humanities strength = wider employability.
Harvey Mudd. Better experience, more personalized classes, research right away, close knit group of friends, challenging in a good way - pushing you to excel rather than weed out
- and 2/3 of the classes are not humanities so it’s not a deterrent if you think 20% v. 30% isn’t that big of a difference, it provides balance but emphasis is stem although they require more balance than your regular engineering program; think that MIT also has a similar amount of such classes, if less prescribed - that should tell you something. But yes having that education helps leading not just to better jobs but also, perhaps more importantly, a more enriching life down the line. There’s a reason when adults were asked which classes stuck with them after college, basically all of them listed something related to humanities/arts/social science. Let yourself be surprised.
Harvey mudd classes are really tough so your child has to be ready to work hard.
@intparent may have more comments.
The Harvey Mudd Core Curriculum, required of all students, is broader than the required intro courses at UCLA. For example, Biology and Chemistry and engineering introductory classes are part of the HMC core and the same classes taken by Bio, Chem, and Engineering majors, but not listed on the UCLA curriculum. The number of courses required to complete the Hum/SocSci requirements for HMC is greater than the number of HSSEAS/GE courses needed for UCLA. If the OP’s kid doesn’t feel committed to the broadly educated scientist mission of HMC, it may not be a good fit. Assuming the kid did reasonably well at either school, I doubt the employability would be hugely different.
Your child may end up enjoying some of the humanities. My S (at Mudd) took a writing class, but it was a writing class about Artificial Intelligence. My D (at Scripps), has taken two humanities at Mudd – one was “History of Modern Physics” and another “Science in Society” (or something like that). Of course, there are plenty of non-sciency choices in the humanities as well but if you kid really wants to they can still get some science even within their humanities.
I’d encourage HMU simply for the size of the school / consortium. UCLA is large and I’ve heard lots of stories about not graduating in 4 years. I don’t know if that’s the case for students who stay put in their major. Something to look into.
Food for thought: I can also tell you that my son and I met with a Google employee (top level guy) who said so many programmers don’t have enough humanities. They can build and app, but have no idea how a human will use the app. He said they often look to hire graduates with more humanities - anthropology, sociology, psychology, etc - and broader critical thinking.
Did your son make it to prospective student days (yesterday & today)? I think students who are a good fit at Mudd know it when they make a longer visit like that. Regarding humanities, I would say my Mudder knows some kids there who aren’t very interested in them. It is a very STEM focused school, even with the humanities courses. Some of the Mudd humanities courses have a science flavor, too – I know she took one course where they read famous sci fi. She has not found the Mudd based humanities courses overly rigorous, either. And there are a lot of choices of classes, given the cross registration opportunities with the consortium.
The broader core curriculum and other hum/soc classes at HMC could open the door to other major or job possibilities in the long run. Also, your son should look at the computer sci clinic program which is the seniors’ capstone project. These are real-world projects funded by various companies that small teams of seniors work on. In some cases, these clinic projects have led to employment with the sponsoring company.
Either is fine.
HM is one of the few super high intensity schools. See the “calculus” course for an example. As others have mentioned, it also has extensive general education requirements. So the student should consider if those academic fit aspects of HM are desirable, neutral, or undesirable.
I think for my student those extensive general education requirements are undesirable. Another question was if research projects at undergrad only school are as complex as at those where grad students are present.
Interesting question (I have no idea), but if your undergrad isn’t going to be able to do the research because there are grad students there, does it matter?
ETA: Along with this question, it would be interesting to know what percentage of undergrads at UCLA get opportunities in research vs. percentage of Mudders. But that said, if the humanities is that much of a turn off to your kid, maybe Mudd isn’t the right place for him/her. Also, what does he/.she prefer in size…that is the obvious big difference in these two schools.
I would think that if the project is tailored to undergrad level, it has to be simpler. But maybe I am wrong.
HM is an extremely elite undergrad school, though.
Mudd, for the reasons @MYOS1634 and others mentioned. However, Mudd is known for its very heavy work load, so if you kid wants a bit of an “easier” (relatively speaking) college experience, then UCLA.
My kid is looking for the most challenging STEM environment that offers great research and internship opportunities.
The senior CS clinic project is a problem or set of problems that a client would like solved. The client pays a fee to get a team of highly motivated students under the guidance of a professor. The students work together to define the problem, propose solutions, perform design and budgetary analyses of the proposals, and make regular presentations about progress to the client. All of the students show off their work during presentation days just before graduation. The problem is one that the client expects/hopes can be solved within a year, and wouldn’t necessarily be the same kind of research that a graduate student would work on over the span of a few years.
The clinic concept was pioneered by the HMC engineering department about 60 years ago and adopted by the computer science department after the creation of the CS major. The clinic experience is a hallmark of the HMC education for engineers and other majors, along with research experience for the science students. Many other schools have since adopted similar capstone type projects for seniors.
Re: internships:
Look here for the companies that regularly hire Mudders (for both internships and after graduation):
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BzR_KHZNACM_cjZTWTlPOHkybEk/view
Re: research
They provide a lot of opportunities on campus—even for freshmen.
Also consider the senior year clinic (https://www.cs.hmc.edu/clinic/info). During clinic, teams of Mudders work in teams on real problems for real companies.
(As for challenging…it’s known as one of the most rigorous…)
UCLA is great, no doubt, but Mudd is special–the kinds of research opportunities available to Mudd undergrads are unmatchable at UCLA–especially in the era of UC budget cuts & crises. Mudd is super elite, make no mistake.