<p>I've applied to a few schools and I was hoping for some outside opinions on the order of which you guys would rank them from Computer Science and Computer Engineering. I care about the college experince as a whole, but my main priorities are as follows:
- Name recognition for the school in the technical field
- Strong and regognized programs for both Computer Science and Computer Engineering (I want the ability to decide what I want to focus on once I get a feel for the two)
- The ability to easily move between the two majors</p>
<p>The schools I applied to are:
- Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
- Georgia Tech
- University of Washington at Seattle
- Bucknell
- UC Berkeley
- Penn State
- Rutgers
- Wesleyan University
- University of Maryland, College Park
- University of Michigan</p>
<p>If you guys could rank these in the order you see fit my priorities or explain pros and cons between some, I'd really value your input.</p>
<p>Cost constraints, financial aid situation, state of residency?</p>
<p>For Berkeley, if you are in the EECS major, changing your emphasis between hardware and software is basically just choosing different upper division courses in the major. If you are in L&S, you need to declare the CS major after completing the prerequisites; this is currently not restricted, but may require a 3.0 or so college GPA in the near future due to the major’s popularity. Again, taking more hardware versus software courses is at the option of the student.</p>
<p>For Washington, be aware that if you are not admitted to the CS major as a freshman, it is extremely competitive to declare the CS major later.</p>
<p>If you care about money then, then we can rank the cheapest first then second cheapest and so on since you will get a great education at all of those schools.</p>
<p>If you do not care about money at all then here’s the rank:-</p>
<ol>
<li>University of California-Berkeley</li>
<li>University of Michigan</li>
<li>Wesleyan University</li>
<li>Georgia Tech(not so well rounded)</li>
<li>Bucknell University</li>
<li>Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute</li>
<li>Pennsylvania State University, University Park</li>
<li>University of Washington at Seattle</li>
<li>University of Maryland, College Park</li>
</ol>