<p>I have been accepted to Northeastern and WPI, and I doubt I will be accepted to Harvey Mudd, but if I were to, I think I would choose Northeastern over it as well. I am pretty set on this, but I thought it would be good to check to make sure I am not making a drastic mistake.</p>
<p>I have visited Northeastern and WPI, and I feel much more at home at Northeastern. I love big cities (NY, Philly, Seattle) and I love the feel of the Northeastern campus. The social scene also seems the best at Northeastern by a significant margin, though I am not the party type. While WPI is a train ride away, it felt much different and I keep getting told that you rarely leave campus when you are in college.</p>
<p>Of course though, academics and preparation in your field is the most important aspect. I want to make sure that my social/location preferences are not outweighing academic strength too much. I feel confident in being prepared at Northeastern with the co-op program, and I feel that there is not much of a significant gap in the programs of the three schools from my research. Is this off-base? I like the academic structure of WPI (4 quarters, 3 classes on average per quarter) as well as the project based learning style, but that is not enough to outweigh the rest.</p>
<p>Once graduated, I realize that the recognition of Northeastern (while it is a growing school) will probably have a decent gap to WPI and Harvey Mudd in the tech community. Can anyone shed any light on how much this gap will be and how this will affect job prospects?</p>
<p>Short Version: Northeastern for best location / experiential learning / academics / social combination, is it crazy?</p>
<p>Don’t make 3 threads asking the same question. You will be a CS major coding all day and you’re not the partying type so don’t consider the social aspect of NE so heavily. Harvey mudd would be the best decision if you wanted to open a lot of opportunities with your CS degree.</p>
<p>Sorry on multiple posts, I thought I would try to post in all three college forums to try to get mixed results of opinion.</p>
<p>Thanks for the response. While I agree to some extent on the social aspect, I am not on the polar opposite side of the spectrum either. I am into music and will be out and about for sure.</p>
<p>The social aspect as I said though is only one part of the decision with experiential learning among other things. I feel the co-op program will open plenty of doors, and get more hands on experience than Harvey Mudd. I know Harvey Mudd is the best option based on name recognition and doors opened, but how severe is the gap between HMC and the other two universities in that category?</p>
<p>Internships, research, and job prospects will be better at HMC than the other two colleges for CS. Co-op won’t open as many doors as you would think. The concentrations and involvements for CS at HMC can’t be compared by the two other colleges.</p>
<p>Anyone can get an internship or a co-op experience at an average company in CS. Mudd is a feeder to some top employers, though (2nd only to Stanford in feeding the Silicon Valley tech companies). If you get into Mudd I would suggest you attend accepted student days at all three of the colleges you are considering, then make up your mind. You don’t have to decide now. My kid thought she would prefer two other colleges she was accepted to over Mudd before attending accepted student days at the 3 schools. Mudd came out the clear winner after spending 24 hours on campus, even though she had done day visits to all of them before (and attended a class, etc, on the day visit). So take advantage of the opportunity to make another visit before making up your mind if you are fortunate enough to be accepted to Mudd.</p>
<p>I have visited Northeastern and WPI and feel pretty strong about my preference there. I have not visited Harvey Mudd. I live in FL so if I were to do more visits, it would have to be Harvey Mudd or Northeastern/WPI. I appreciate the advice, and I will try to make it out there for an overnight visit if I can.</p>
<p>Haha yeah believe me, I highly doubt I will. For what it’s worth, I also applied for rejection from Stanford :D/ Thanks for the advice again, if I get accepted to Mudd I may be back here in April.</p>
<p>Oh Stanford this year is a nightmare…REA rejected here…
Anyway I would choose Mudd if I were you, generally California is a better place for CS majors, and Mudd offers great pre-professional focus.
If you’re worried about social stuff, well first you are a CS major and second you have 5C community, which is awesome.</p>
Good luck. But if you get in I highly recommend that you visit.</p>