I plan on getting a Master’s in CS. Not shooting for MIT or Stanford for my Master’s or anything, but even a local state school like SF State, Cal Poly, or SJSU will do.
I’m worried that getting my Bachelor’s in web design (with a CS minor) at Purdue will make it tough for me to grasp the concepts I’ll learn in the master’s program due to the lack of CS/math/physics/stats foundation I had in my bachelor’s.
What do you think? Will I struggle in the CS master’s program due to my bachelor’s curriculum?
You need to research the prerequisite courses for admission into the Master’s program. A Master’s program is not going to admit students who do not have the fundamentals of their course of study. You may be able to take the necessary courses as electives while earning your Bachelor’s degree, or you can take them later - but you won’t likely be admitted to a Master’s program with only the courses required for the web design degree.
And most state schools will let you enroll as a non-degree student to take additional classes that would help you get into and succeed in a graduate program.
^What they said. You have to meet the prerequisites to get into a master’s program in CS; you can’t just enter without them (because the program knows you would struggle). You can’t learn graduate-level concepts of data structures and algorithms if haven’t even taken an introductory course in the field.
Your prior posts make it sound like you are an incoming freshman to Purdue this fall. Why don’t you major in computer science if you intend to get a master’s in computer science? Even if you have a hard time getting into CS there, a CS-related major - like industrial design, cybersecurity, or or computer and information sciences, for example - would make things easier. Or you could need to take all the CS prerequisite courses as electives, maybe minoring in CS.
@vinashana - rather than asking others what will suffice, I again recommend researching graduate programs in CS and finding out what the requirements are yourself. You can then look at the courses offered for various majors/minors and determine what is sufficient.
Also be aware of pre-requisites for courses. CS knowledge builds upon foundations - in order to take some of the courses required for graduate school, there may be additional courses required to obtain that fundamental knowledge.
Part of being successful in CS is having an innate curiosity and a need to figure things out. There’s no problem asking for help and guidance, however this is a question you can easily find the answer to yourself.
It is a good idea to do your homework but in general, you should be able to get most of the prerequisites with a minor in CS. Your lack of physical sciences will probably not be a factor as CS majors don’t really take a lot of these courses.
My recommendations from someone with an BS/Math&MS/CS looking to start a MS/CS. If you are doing machine learning/AI you probably need more math. Maybe the 4th calc class and advanced linear algebra.
Calc 1,2,3
Linear Algebra
Probability (the hard Math Dept version, not the easy business version)
Discrete Math (CS dept first choice, Math dept second choice)
if they use the Cornell Coq program in discrete take it somewhere else unless they offer a class specific in just Coq in addition to traditional Discrete Math.
some kind of hardware class where you learn machine/assembler language
Objects
Data Structures
Programming Languages
Intro to Algorithms (optional but easier as an undergrad)
Again do your homework, but depending on how rigourous the MS program is, you need to step up your game.