<p>@sosconcern I’ve made many spreadsheets and considered many different place I visited pitt and I don’t like the city atmosphere, and I want a place where I can meet people I like and be comfortable and not feel overwhelmed with people or partying</p>
<p>I would encourage you to apply to the best list you can. Every campus has some students who choose to party. You can find a ‘tribe’. Make sure you include the right schools in your application list. Don’t want you to have ‘buyer’s remorse’. Do you need something close to home to get home a few times each semester, or ‘if the campus env’t is right’ you can live farther away and only come home for major school breaks? </p>
<p>I think if you find the right school, going there all four years would be good with building friendships. Sounds like you are not as social unless with the right people - I get that; my H is a EE that is only very social with certain people. He went to a school that was really almost exclusively engineering, and at that time almost exclusively male.</p>
<p>@sosconcern I would like to stay at a college all for all four years and I realize all campuses have partiers but I would prefer one with less partying if possible </p>
<p>I would take off the schools where you have about 0 chance of admission like U Rochester and Case Western. Given your history, I would also avoid schools where the CS program has a reputation of being a bit of a meat grinder - Purdue, Va Tech, maybe Maryland.</p>
<p>Binghamton may also be out of range for you with a 3.1. Try Albany, and you could pair that with Siena for a visit.</p>
<p>@magnetron can you help define a meat grinder…I think I know what you mean but I’m just making sure.
That being said where do you think I have a chance.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>LOL! You go in whole and come out chopped up into little bitty pieces. At least that’s what it feels like. </p>
<p>Basically, most schools will teach to the students that they have, some may teach above them, some below them. </p>
<p>Any course can be made as hard or as easy as the problems that the professor assigns. </p>
<p>The schools that attract really strong students have to satisfy their needs too, so the profs can make the courses pretty darn hard. A good chunk of the students (pun intended) come out feeling pretty ground up. </p>
<p>@classicrockerdad where do you think my best fit is
Leave out CC as an option for now </p>
<p>Rochester Institute of Technology</p>
<p>Just want to point out that the 25th - 75th percentiles for Computer Science at RIT are 1810 - 2070, so right now your SATs are below the 25th percentile (page 50, even though that particular page is not numbered):</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.rit.edu/upub/pdfs/Prospectus.pdf”>http://www.rit.edu/upub/pdfs/Prospectus.pdf</a></p>
<p>Good luck in getting them up to your goal of close to 2000!</p>
<p>Binghamton is getting harder to get into every year.</p>
<p>Rochester and Case are reaches for you. </p>
<p>Stony Brook - they have an excellent computer science department. I have no idea how hard it is to get in. I think your math score is at the lower end, especially for Comp Sci.</p>
<p>VA Tech - reach</p>
<p>Purdue - easier to get into but harder to stay in. Very challenging environment. And it’s a big school. You seem to not want a big school, so I’m not sure it’s a good fit for you.</p>
<p>Lehigh/MD/Bucknell - these schools are all hard to get into. I would not consider these matches for you. And again, MD is very big. If you have eliminated your own state school, I have no idea why MD would be on your list.</p>
<p>RIT - I have visited RIT with my daughter and was very impressed. It is a great tech environment. Unless you are looking for a more liberal arts environment, I think it’s a good fit with a supportive environment. Their co-op program is great. And the students all seemed happy to be there. It is also harder to get into than it used to be. </p>
<p>I don’t know why Sacred Heart is on your list. Is that the one in Massachusetts? That seems kind of random. Is that the type of environment you prefer?</p>
<p>For what it’s worth - Penn State is very big, and has people of all types. There are plenty of people who never watch a football game and don’t party. On the other hand, I would not call it a particularly nurturing environment. For that reason, I would say maybe it isn’t a good fit. </p>
<p>@VMT
I realize my list is very broad but if you have suggestions for me I am open to ideas.
My ideal is that I can find a school within approx 500 mi of Pittsburgh where I feel at home, and I don’t want to be a numbers I would prefer to find a niche in my school and feel welcomed and collaborative with my other classmates.</p>
<p>@vmt I’m not interested in a huge party atmosphere. I realize all colleges have parties but I don’t want a penn state like atmosphere if possible.</p>
<p>Are you Catholic? How about Franciscan University in Steubenville? I don’t know the reputation of their computer science department, but it have the environment you’re looking for. </p>
<p>@somuch2learn I’m not religious but I’m open to ideas</p>
<p>I did the search here on this site putting in states near you and Chatham University, right there in Pittsburgh, came up as a good match. Put in your stats and click off the states you’d be interested in, put computer science as your major, check off the box about not a party school, etc… and see what you get. Elizabethtown College also came to mind. It’s small, very friendly students, supportive environment, not in a city, etc…</p>
<p>OP large schools have honors programs and there are many ways students are not ‘just a number’. </p>
<p>If you stretch yourself for a highly rated CS program and perform rather mediocre, you may not be considered for certain career opportunities. You want to be successful as well as feel successful. I would encourage you to look at the best matches. If you do test better and have that in, that will also help you determine the match situation.</p>
<p>I think students do perform better where they are ‘happy’ - so you have to visit campuses and see what the CS program and campus ‘vibe’ is really like. Talk to students, esp those you think are like you.</p>
<p>Are your parents helping you in this process? They may have some insights with campus visits, etc.</p>
<p>My nephew wanted to have top grades in his CS program, so he didn’t load CS in 4 years, he completed in 5 years (and he did a year Co-op with an outstanding opportunity, and a summer intern that was also a great opportunity. He got a great job as a web designer, and the company is putting a lot of training in with him too. He went to his state ‘techie’ school, Tennessee Tech. He had the state scholarship deal (GPA plus ACT 29) for his tuition first four years, and used his Co-op savings to help pay for year 5. He graduated magnum cum laude. He wouldn’t even go tour UT because of the size university and he was turned off by what he considered their party atmosphere - which I think was wrong not to at least tour…he was happy at TT though, and he used prof’s office hours when needed. He found a tribe pretty early in his dorm life and classes.</p>
<p>SStephen, I will second the RIT recommendation. We are in the Pittsburgh area and my son is finishing at RIT. There are quite a few students from this area. He was in Game Design, so it was a smaller major, but he found a great social group (he was not a partier either). He had a similar SAT to yours but a higher ACT (31) and got a merit scholarship based on that and being in the top 20% of his HS class. RIT was very generous with AP credits, even giving him credit for the 3’s he had on both AP English exams, plus some other tests so he went in with 5 credits and will graduate after 3.5 years of classes. I have been very impressed with the places he and his friends are getting job offers from, often based on their co-op experiences.</p>
<p>@mamabear1234 thanks for your help I just want to have as many options as I can</p>
<p>-</p>
<p>Try York College of Pennsylvania:
<a href=“http://www.ycp.edu/academics/academic-departments/physical-sciences/programs-in-engineering-and-computer-science/computer-science/”>http://www.ycp.edu/academics/academic-departments/physical-sciences/programs-in-engineering-and-computer-science/computer-science/</a></p>
<p>They are private but quite reasonable, and require three semesters of co-op.</p>