<p>Hey everyone, I was wondering if I could get some help in determining if my 5 year plan is reasonable. I plan on attending Georgia Tech and double majoring in CS and applied mathematics. I am wondering if i could do that and also get my masters in CS the next year. Is this 5 year plan realistic?</p>
<p>I dont know how long a masters in CS takes to acquire but you can definitely double in math/cs and graduate in 4 years or less.</p>
<p>Check the requirements for the three things (bs math, bs cs, ms cs). </p>
<p>In my opinion to do all that in 5 years would require you to take classes in the Summer as well as Fall/Spring semesters, at least once or twice. Doing it without any Summer classes would either mean you’re taking a lot of credit hours per semester (like 21) or you came in with a lot of AP credit.</p>
<p>I plan on taking summer classes at a local university during the summer and I know a lot of classes overlap. I believe around half of them do.</p>
<p>I think you are overestimating the overlap. There are only a small handful of required Math classes for CS majors (Combinatorics, Statistics, Calc I-III, DiffEQ’s for some threads, Numerical Analysis for some threads). This is not close to half a Math major at all. Even if you include general education requirements, half is pushing it.</p>
<p>Check out:
[GT</a> Catalog : Mathematics : BS Applied Mathematics](<a href=“http://www.catalog.gatech.edu/colleges/cos/math/ugrad/math/bsmath.php]GT”>http://www.catalog.gatech.edu/colleges/cos/math/ugrad/math/bsmath.php)
and
[GT</a> Catalog : COC : BS CS Thread : Modeling - Simulation & Theory](<a href=“http://www.catalog.gatech.edu/colleges/coc/ugrad/comsci/threads/degreq/mod-sim-theory2.php]GT”>http://www.catalog.gatech.edu/colleges/coc/ugrad/comsci/threads/degreq/mod-sim-theory2.php)</p>
<p>Basically zero overlap after the second year.</p>
<p>Yeah, if you were MINORING in math that would be doable. Doing a double major in that time frame would be incredibly difficult and stressful.</p>
<p>I was actually speaking of the core requirements are the same. Sorry about the confusion.</p>
<p>Tech does not allow “double majors”, they call it a second undergraduate degree. To earn two undergraduate degrees, you need to complete the course requirements for both degrees plus 36 additional hours. The MSCS is 36 hours that cannot overlap with your undergraduate, so that’s 72 hours. A BS Applied Math is 122 hours, so you’re at 194 hours. Looking at the overlap between BSCS and BS Math, there’s 52 additional hours, or 246 total hours needed for the 3 degrees.</p>
<p>Is that possible in 5 years? Technically, sure. Practically? A lot would have to go right with classes aligning properly, you’d need to have a lot of AP credit, and you’d kill yourself with your course loads. And that’s assuming you can keep your GPA high enough to be admitted to the graduate CS program.</p>
<p>Is it smart? You’d be graduating with no work experience and no research.</p>
<p>yeah i was considering Auburn University a state school that only makes you only have 25 hours that don’t overlap</p>
<p>Why don’t you just do a BS/MS in CS instead of bothering with the double major? What advantage are you hoping to gain?</p>
<p>I am currently in the same situation except I will be be at Michigan in the fall. My ideal reason for dual majoring in Math/CompSci is because I thought it would help me get into some top grad schools ( ie. Stanford/MIT ). But is this crazy? Lately I have been beginning to think its dumb to dual major anything with the sole intention of getting into top grad schools…</p>
<p>Doesn’t it look good for grad schools and future employers to see an applicant with a dual major in math and computer science?</p>
<p>Quick Side question:</p>
<p>How about dual majoring in Computer Science and Computer Engineering? This might be more doable, but does dual majoring in Computer Science and Computer Engineering increase your employability?</p>
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<p>If you want to go to a top grad school, major in one field, keep your GPA as high as possible, and find the best research opportunities available at your school.</p>
<p>For grad school, research is more important than test scores, GPA, undergraduate school, or major (even double major). It’s more impressive to be a 2nd tier graduate with a 3.2 GPA and two A-journal publications and excellent references than a 1st tier graduate with a 3.8 GPA and no research. </p>
<p>Double majors, especially in closely related fields, rarely make sense (they can, but usually do not). If your goal is to apply to a Stanford MS CS program, you might as well earn a BSCS with a minor in Math, then an MS Math before applying. Schools will let you earn an MS in a field in which you don’t have a BS as long as your BS was fundamentally similar (and a minor will help that).</p>
<p>People often think that two BS degrees or a double major makes them more employable. That’s very rarely the case. I often saw two BS students with one in Mechanical / Electrical / Chemical engineering and the other in Physics/Chemistry/Math (frequently as part of a 3-2 program). If I was hiring a chemical engineer, I only looked at the chemical engineering degree. The chemistry degree was completely ignored, and in discussing the situation with other hiring managers, that’s generally the case across the board.</p>
<p>With that said, I can see some combinations of degrees as valuable. One would be CS and CompE.</p>
<p>My undergraduate degree is definitely a hybrid Math/CS degree (Computational Math with enough CS elective to have a CS degree) and it can be done in 4 years.</p>
<p>The issue is this: The courses that are generally bridging both CS and Math (numerical analysis of ODE, PDE & Matrices, combinatorics, graph theory, cryptography, etc) varies from school to school as far as if the course is cross-listed or double-counted. Another thing is that many times those “hybrid Math/CS” courses are cross-listed in graduate programs more than undergraduate programs.</p>
<p>In looking at Georgia Tech’s Math and CS programs, it seems like only one course Math/CS 4777 is in both departments at the undergrad level. Georgia Tech has more Math/CS cross-listed courses at the graduate level. Since Georgia Tech also has a Computational Science degree, it seems like the Math courses are overlapping with that department more than the CS department.</p>
<p>Not to say that you should attend a different school for graduate school but look at the graduate Applied Math and CS programs at U-Illinois. A BUNCH of overlapping courses there. At U-Illinois, you can basically select the same 10 courses and choose whether you want a Applied Math degree or CS degree.</p>
<p>Also, although I am VERY BIASED on advising you to do the Math/CS combo major, I would NOT double major. I would DUAL-major, where you complete both requirements within the same 120 hour semester (undergrad) or 30-36 hour (graduate) program. Of course that means you can find a bunch of overlapping courses…or use up all of your free electives.</p>
<p>I think a better idea would be to minor in math. My uncle was a CS major, when he was in his last year he saw that he only needed one more math class for the math minor and he did it, and it was simple. He was accepted fully funded to a good tech school for modeling in cognitive sciences. There was absolutely no reason he couldn’t have gone to a top tier school, though he was an international student and would likely not have been fully funded.</p>
<p>If you’re definitely planning on grad school, then just major in CS. Like others have said, it’s better to do research and get a high GPA, those are the two best things to do to help you get into a good program.</p>
<p>I can contribute to the usefulness of a dual major CS/CompE at Tech… you’re not going to double major and graduate in any reasonable time frame. But, for CompE, you can use CS classes for your engineering electives. So what I’m doing is a CompE major, CS minor; the 2000-3000 level classes count towards the minor and 3000-4000 level CS classes count for my compE major. I like it because you learn truly EVERYTHING bottoms up about computers; CompE is universally acknowledged to be an extra-difficult major EVEN for georgia tech, but if you’re interested, it’s worth it!
I can pretty much answer any questions you have on that combination :)</p>