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<p>Do you wish to build computer devices as mouse, IC, switches, CPU’s or is it that you what to build devices with computers in them?</p>
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<p>Prior experience is the number 1 attribute that an potential employer looks at. That is why a resume of a fresh grad has the educational information near the top of the resume because that is all a fresh graduate has to lean on. Experienced professionals put their educational information at near the bottom of the resume because it matters less and really matter as far as a completed/non-completed afterthought.</p>
<p>So it is not a bad idea to take a part-time MBA program after some experience. Also, at some schools, you won’t need to depend on your GRE scores as much when you already have proven experience. Besides, most MBA programs have Information Systems concentrations and sometimes are flexible enough to allow you to substitute more “harder-edged” CS courses.</p>
<p>“Quote:
Originally Posted by sy5temshock
With that, it would be cool to be a software developer, and make computer devices on my spare time
Do you wish to build computer devices as mouse, IC, switches, CPU’s or is it that you what to build devices with computers in them?”</p>
<p>I would like to do both…</p>
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<p>It is a better option than graduating unemployed if you are accepted to a master’s program with funding at a school that is a recruiting upgrade from your current school (which is?). But if you get a good[1] job upon graduation, the industry experience gained is likely to be more valuable for a future career in industry than master’s degree study other than the smaller number of jobs and careers that require or prefer a graduate degree.</p>
<p>[1] In this context, it means one in which you can gain valuable experience in one or more areas of CS / software development that you are interested in making a career out of.</p>
<p>My current school for CS undergrad is California State Los Angeles…</p>
<p>(crickets chirping)</p>
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<p>And?..</p>
<p>Can you build me a web app?
Can you program in Java?
Can you create entity-relationship diagrams?
And have verifiable experience?</p>
<p>If you can answer “yes”…I (and many other hiring managers) could care less if your degree is from California State-Dominguez Hills.</p>
<p>I mentioned CSU-Dominguez Hills because yours truly has no less than 9 graduate credits from that school that were ACCEPTED by University of Wisconsin and counted to my 30 credits.</p>
<p>Wow… UofW?? I see that is ranked #11 in computer science. What was your GPA? What would you recommend for someone who wants to get into a top-20 or top-10 school from a CalState school? If I wanted to do a MS… Other than those like CalPoly Pomona or SLO…</p>
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<p>I was in the plain 'ole Masters of Engineering program which a mostly online/distance program…not the #11 MSCS program which is full-time only. When you do not have super-high grades and still want to goto grad school, you have to pick and choose your battles…I mean programs. </p>
<p>Now to answer your question…</p>
<p>If your grades are high enough, you can still get into some Top-10/Top-20 programs but it IS EASIER to get into the part-time and/or distance/online graduate programs because:</p>
<p>1) They are not funded…so no big risk by the school if you do not do well
2) You (or your employer) are footing the bills
3) You are seeing tape-delay or streaming versions of a course and not requiring as much time from a professor.</p>
<p>Add to that, most of the students are current engineers so having experience kind of reduces the “usual minimum admission requirements”. You have to think about it in the following points:</p>
<p>a) Who is to say that this engineer with 5+ years experience cannot do the academic work just as good as some inexperienced fresh B.S. degree student?</p>
<p>b) College is a business</p>
<p>Besides, one way to get into graduate engineering programs without super-high GPA’s and big-name schools is to take 2 or 3 courses as a “provisional” or “non-degree” student…then evaluate you after the 3 courses. Remember, since you or your employer is paying for the courses and the school is not funding you like a full-time student, there is not much risk for the school.</p>
<p>Now lets say you ace the first 3 courses. Well hell, that is 9 credits out of the 30 needed (I know some programs are 33 or 36). There AIN’T NO WAY that a university is going to reject a graduate student who just aced basically 1/3 of a graduate program and poses as no financial risk to the school…Unless you are Columbia or Cornell who specifically says that admission is still not guaranteed.</p>
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<p>The main difference is that non-local employers will visit the career centers of the best known schools in the field. So UCLA and USC students will see more non-local employers visiting their school career centers than CSU-LA students will. So the CSU-LA student will need to be more aggressive at finding employers to apply to when nearing graduation.</p>
<p>Being local to employers also helps; students at SJSU will likely see more “Silicon Valley” computer companies recruiting at the school career center than students at other CSU campuses.</p>
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<p>Do not confuse Ambition to education/school or to Smarts.</p>
<p>@Long Prime, </p>
<p>why did you ask “Do you wish to build computer devices as mouse, IC, switches, CPU’s or is it that you what to build devices with computers in them?”</p>
<p>I guess I would like to do both, but I don’t know what to expect from this… I just like the idea…</p>
<p>I figure that our son with a MS degree is behind his undergrad classmates (2006) who went to work immediately on graduation. I estimate he is after 4 years, behind by $90k gross, even with a fully funded MS degree, very good postgrad internships, and working at UofW as a mechanical/cs staff development engineer. The disparity will probably grow by at least $10k/per year as long as he stays within the academic setting. </p>
<p>The upside is that he can currently afford the pay difference, and has enjoyed experiences and developed an extensive network. </p>
<p>goodluck. bye.</p>
<p>Maybe getting a MS to specialize in another CS area is a good idea to fall back on (just in case)?</p>
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<p>That would only make sense if your undergraduate course selection somehow managed to avoid almost all of the courses whose concepts were useful in industry, if an industry job and career is your goal.</p>
<p>From a career or economic standpoint, everyone is telling you that an MS is unlikely to help you, unless you have no other options besides the unemployment line at graduation time. If you want to do an MS to study something in more depth because you are interested in it, that is fine as long as you realize that it is not generally better from a career or economic standpoint from getting a good industry job right after graduating with a bachelor’s degree.</p>
<p>Huh… yeah, I just want to make the best decision possible. I just got done talking to a friend that suggested not to avoid doing a MS (though he is a PolSci grad). Maybe I should talk to his cousin who not only does lectures at universities, but he is also an award winner for his discovery, I believe, and contribution to networking. Yeah, thanks for all the input. I don’t think I will finish talking to people about it until I am 100% sure what I want to do. I will go on for at least may 9 months before I actually make a decision to apply for a MS or not. Maybe I will want to qualify for research or something…</p>
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<p>Different majors have different trade-offs (career/economic and otherwise) to getting a master’s or doctoral degree.</p>
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<p>There is nothing that says that you cannot apply to both graduate school and jobs if you are not sure at the time the deadlines to apply to graduate school are near. (Well, nothing except the fees to apply to graduate school and take GREs if needed, and time spent doing so.)</p>
<p>Thanks. Yeah, I will definitely seek grad admissions and jobs at the same time. Sounds like that should be worth it.</p>
<p>@GLOBALTRAVELER,</p>
<p>tried to send another PM, but it got rejected because, it seems that your mailbox might be full. Not a big deal, though. Just wanted to say thanks for the information. I think I need to look further into which colleges offer what online because, googling for online schools always turns up the usual, such as University of Phoenix, etc…</p>
<p>My experience is dated, but at the fairly highly technical place I worked at, where many had BS and MS CS degrees, an MBA would have been looked upon with disdain. In fact, engineers had a hard time getting the tuition benefit for MBA studies; the company did not value that. As for BS vrs MS in CS, I think having the MS it makes getting some jobs easier but it probably won’t help much pay-wise, and once in the workplace they’ll make assignments on what you can do, not what degree you have. </p>
<p>You can teach at a community college w/the MS - there is one path open to MS people and not to BS people.</p>
<p>What I think might be a good investement is getting a masters degree in a specialized profession related to computer science, such as systems engineering, analytics, or bioinformatics. A regular computer science masters is not a better asset than a bachelors in CS with two years experience.</p>