Looking for advice

College Search & Selection
1

Hey there, current high school senior here from south Florida and I just wanted some input from current students (or really anyone with an opinion) on some of the schools I applied too.

I’m still waiting on decisions from Stanford and Michigan however my top 2 choices as of now are Northeastern Honors and University of Florida (hopefully honors). I also got some letter from GW saying to expect good news from them, but no formal acceptance yet. I plan on studying computer sciences and I want to eventually try for a dual degree with business or something of the like. I got a scholarship and good aid from Northeastern and am in state for UF so they would both be relatively inexpensive.

I’m a little torn because I really am leaning toward Northeastern but I’ve heard the social life is questionable (something I never really considered till now) and that it’s ranked lower than UF. The Co-Op program at NEU seems like a great plus though and Boston is a beautiful city and the dedicated CS school at NEU seems really interesting so I’m torn. Also, don’t want to count my chickens before they hatch, but Michigan seems like a good value and great school all around as well (I’m going to assume Stanford is a no.) GW on the other hand seems a bit too expensive, and haven’t gotten any scholarship or aid info yet.

Any opinions on the schools rankings, if the honors program(s) change anything, experience in computer science at either, location, social life, just anything that any students have to offer or any information that anyone thinks would be relevant would be awesome!

Thank you all in advance! :slight_smile:

2

Where would NEU be ranked lower than UF? By standardized scoring, for example, the schools barely overlap.

3

I read on some of the college rankings specifically for computer science that NEU is lower. I very well could be and would love to be wrong though haha

4

Ranking wise, UF’s engineering undergraduate program is higher ranked, as is it’s CS grad program (for whatever that’s worth). NEU’s overall engineering grad program is ranked one spot higher than UF. (Just using US News as an example).

UF has the higher ranked undergraduate business program.

Of course, rankings should be taken with a grain of salt…

I’m sure you’ll do well at either school. Both have excellent placement rates for CS (as do most CS programs). Good Luck!

5

I don’t know much about NEU, but just straight gut instinct - I would not pick NEU over UF.

6

Re #3, that was well-sourced and accurate. (Though I’d throw out the grad ranking, and perhaps consider as well that the referenced undergraduate rankings for the respective schools all fall within a fairly narrow 3.0 to 3.6 range when viewed by their “score” equivalents.)

7

Where do you see yourself working ?
What type of environment do you see yourself in? (big city, 17,000 students, private, geographical diversity / college town, 50,000 students, socio-economic diversity)
Do you like 4 clear seasons and do you enjoy snow ? Or do you like tropical weather with hot, humid summers and mild winters ?

8

As a fellow Floridian currently attending NEU for CS, the program is amazing. The teaching style and philosophy for CS is really unique - it focuses much more on program design rather than simply how to code and make things work. Northeastern developed its own language for teaching that is used at other colleges as well (notably Brown).

Here’s a really cool essay from the founder of the program - he currently teaches software development here: http://www.ccs.neu.edu/home/matthias/Thoughts/Growing_a_Programmer.html

The co-op program is amazing for CS - there’s a large and growing tech hub in Boston, and CS students have some of the best options in the school - I know people working for Apple, Google, Facebook, Intuit, and tons of other big name companies, as well as plenty of smaller local ones. The co-op pay for CS hits an average of $25 an hour too, which doesn’t hurt.

Northeastern also has a good business school and a combined Business / CS degree that’s quite popular. Here’s the degree specimen:
http://www.northeastern.edu/rasala/data/ug2013/CS_Business_2013.htm

Rankings wise, NEU and UF are pretty much the same tier for both CS and Business - people will argue one is slightly better for both directions and both schools.

I’m not sure that “questionable” is the right word to describe the social life here. UF and NEU are certainly very different - UF is a very traditional college experience - NEU is a school in the heart of Boston, an amazing city. The social life revolves around different things. Personally, I hated the idea of what social life was at UF - I wanted to go out and explore Boston on the weekends. There’s a pretty decent party scene at both schools, but UF has a more party-centered environment. UF will have much more greek activity. In terms of friends and general social activity, both are going to offer lots of different groups of people - you’ll be able to find your type of friends at most any college.

Personally, I would go NEU all the way - I’ve absolutely loved it here and the CS program is frankly amazing. Since it’s its own college, there’s an amazing support network. There are 30 people on staff for the first CS class alone with round the clock office hours - I actually TA myself for the class. Boston is amazing and I’m having the time of my life.

To me, it sounds like you would fit in great at NEU - UF is a good school too, but the fit seems to clearly be at Northeastern.

If you have any other questions, feel free to ask here or message me :slight_smile: