<p>So I spoke with my father and being an engineer, he believes I'd be more employable with a BS in CS rather than a BA with my career choice. I was interested in foreign language as I speak 3 and plan to learn more and I wanted to take more liberal arts classes. Now, however, I feel like I want to stick with my stem route since I've always been a stem kid. We looked at the first semester course outline for a potential CS at COE (freshman year) and we are worried that even with transferring in mind pre-frosh, I will still fall behind. Does anyone have any advice, suggestions, or anecdotes about transferring in my specific situation? I know engineering is hard to transfer into but I'm already stem-focused and just made a bad decision when applying. I also know that Cornell says there's no difference between the degrees, but to employers there will be, I feel. Also I am still a high school senior, but I am leaning toward Cornell, so I am trying to plan ahead. Thanks!</p>
<p>I’m not sure that your conclusion, or your father’s, is correct, for CS specifically. Though it could be.
I think you should get opinions from actual CS people, not engineers. . The CS people who volunteer on CC would be one resource.
It seems to me that, as a CS major, you will be taking a certain number of CS courses, and then a bunch of other courses that are not really relevant to CS employers. It’s not obvious to me why they would care about whether those irrelevant (to them) courses were French literature, or thermodynamics.</p>
<p>Engineering is a different story. But you are not shooting for engineering, it seems.</p>
<p>All things being equal, I think you should learn what you want to learn in college. It is four years you will never get to do over.</p>
<p>If you remain committed to transfer, you can arrange your schedule so you would not miss much on the engineering front. Most freshman engineering students take mostly math and science courses that are actually CAS courses. You could take the same courses, save for maybe the one or two that are actually listed in engineering. (unless this has changed…)</p>
<p>I attended a million years ago, but back then I knew many stem types who attended CAS.
I still remember the calculator race between two sophomores on my hallway, an engineering OR major and a CAS chemistry major. Though I no longer recall who won.</p>
<p>Must be great to be a HS kid and know what employers want.</p>
<p>A CS degree from CAS is exactly the same as one from COE. The difference leis in the classes you take besides your CS classes.</p>
<p>It’s actually not as hard as you think it is. You’re allowed to take engineering classes, even if you’re not in engineering. So if you’re completely sure you want to be an engineer, then sign up for the engineering pre-req classes (Math 1910, Chem 2090 etc). Arts and Science has a counter-part (Math 1110 and Chem 2080) but only the engineering versions are accepted for the engineering major. Definitely talk with an adviser, but I believe if you do well, you’re able to transfer to the engineering school (which I heard isn’t too hard) after 1-3 semesters.</p>
<p>Again, definitely talk to an adviser ASAP when you get on campus!</p>
<p>Below is some info about internal transferring:</p>
<p><a href=“Internal Transfer to Cornell Engineering”>http://www.engineering.cornell.edu/resources/advising/intransfer.cfm</a></p>
<p>I have three friends who are actually doing the same thing. They’re CS majors in A&S and are planning to transfer to CS engineering. They’re taking the engineering courses instead of A&S version of the courses. One is actually interning at Yahoo this summer as a freshman, so I don’t know if that says anything about employers and BA vs. BS, but then again they all come from extensive CS backgrounds …</p>