<p>For UIUC, UMAA, and GT, you may want to go to the forums for those schools and the financial aid forum to see if they are likely to offer sufficient need or merit aid to out of state students. If not, it may not be worth the bother.</p>
<p>If you are looking into CSUs, the Cal Polys and SJSU are probably the top CSU picks for CS. If local to “Silicon Valley” is desired, you may want to add UCSC to your list of UCs.</p>
<p>What you may want to do is determine which schools are safe for both admissions and net cost after non-loan financial aid (the mid-level UCs and the CSUs are likely candidates). Then subtract any schools that you would not choose over your safeties.</p>
<p>Which schools are those? The OP already has all the schools ranked higher in CS in his/her list. Which schools surpass Princeton and Harvard in CS? Which schools are better than UPenn and Columbia, that the OP doesn’t already have on his/her list? You’re suggesting public schools like Maryland and UNC, which no one worth their salt would put ahead of most of the Ivies for CS. And the OP already said the financial aid is of utmost importance (he/she even bolded it), so your suggestion of OOS public schools (which don’t give much finaid to OOS students) baffles me even more, especially considering that the Ivies you say he/she should take off the list are widely regarded to be better than those two public schools for CS.</p>
<p>TBH, MisterK, you don’t seem to know much about CS schools - this is the second time that you’ve given misinformation on the topic with no source to back up your absurd assertion (the last time being that Toronto “isn’t on the map” for CS in Canada when it’s actually #1, and Waterloo being “the best” for CS when it’s nowhere near). Please support your suggestions with concrete data or don’t suggest anything at all, especially when the goal of this forum is to inform, not to mislead.</p>
<p>The Ivies are very prestigious schools, wonderful places where you really couldn’t go wrong. But CS isn’t a particular strength for those schools, and I feel that their CS ratings are somewhat inflated due to the general prestige. Just my opinion. You have a different opinion, which is perfectly fine, and I respect it. It’s OK if you disagree, but please, there’s no reason to be disagreeable.</p>
<p>^ it is a reason to be disagreeable if you provide misinformation and don’t give any sources, and then ignore my post contesting your claims on multiple threads.</p>
<p>This has nothing to do with opinion. That’s not helpful to the OP or to anyone who reads this thread and others. You have not shown why their CS ratings are “inflated” due to general prestige; I agree that such a phenomenon exists, but such is not the case here. I’ve backed it up with objective data, like publications and citations, the “gold standard” of measuring quality among university departments.</p>
<p>If you have any data that supports your “gut feeling” that CS isn’t a “particular strength for those schools,” please share it. I’m devoting the next 5-6 years of my life to CS and possibly many years after (if I go into academia), so if you know something I don’t, I’d love for you to share it. I’m sure others would as well.</p>
<p>In the other thread, I conceded that Toronto is better than I realized. My information was old, and Toronto has improved greatly - whereas Waterloo has been strong for a long time.</p>
<p>But my info on the ivies is still current. So I shared it.</p>
<p>You have not shown why their CS ratings are “inflated” due to general prestige; I agree that such a phenomenon exists, but not for CS.</p>
<p>That’s curious; you do seem to agree (somewhat). In what fields do you believe that the ivies have inflated ratings, if not CS? And why would CS be exempt from this phenomenon? To me, CS is actually one of the more obvious examples, but how would you explain that exception?</p>
<p>@MisterK
Sorry, I’m not too familiar with these abbreviations: “Maryland, UNC and UT”. Which schools exactly are these? Also, I’m looking mostly for a mix of strength and prestige, with more emphasis on strength.</p>
<p>@ucbalumnus
Thanks! I’ll look into that. Before I take finances into consideration for my list though, I still want to make sure I have a reasonable list of schools to apply to because my current list right now looks like most of it is based more on chance with all those reach schools…I’m not quite sure which ones would be a match and safety for me there. I’ll be checking out every school’s financial aid afterwards.</p>
<p>@phantasmagoric
I’ve been looking at the ranking site you provided me and it’s really useful, thanks! But I do have a question about the ratio you mentioned earlier - how does that work, and how should I read the ratio (what does it show, etc)?</p>
<p>Sorry, but you were the one to first assert that such phenomenon is occurring in the Ivies with respect to CS. The burden of proof is on you. So why do you believe that it is occurring here? That ties into my several requests for you to provide data/sources to back up your assertions. Once you do that, I’d be happy to extrapolate on this point of general prestige influencing individual departments’ prestige.</p>
<p>FWIW I say that such is not the case with CS because I have metrics, which virtually every academic uses, to judge quality, and those objective metrics place the Ivies well in CS. You have not shown why you think they don’t deserve their place or why these objective metrics are wrong. Please do.</p>
<p>larrylamarck,</p>
<p>You’re welcome :)</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Basically, just divide the # citations by the # publications to get the average number of citations per publication. Then you can compare that ratio for different universities. The reason you’d want to look at this ratio is that raw number of publications, which many rankings are based on, don’t tell the whole story; a university can have a huge number of publications but still not be very well-regarded in that field because their publications are almost never cited. Since citations are used as a measure of “importance,” they’re used as a proxy for determining the quality of the research done at a university. Thus, a higher ratio means higher quality research on average.</p>
<p>So sure, Brown isn’t ranked super high, but that’s only because it’s small, and small departments are penalized in departmental rankings. See this for more of an explanation (from JHU):</p>
<p>So Brown, among others, may have a small department because it’s a small university, but the research that it does has more citations, and is thus more significant on a per-capita basis. Brown’s ratio is 19, whereas CMU’s is 16. For comparison, MIT’s is 20 and Stanford’s is 22.</p>
<p>Actually, I was only agreeing that “such a phenomenon exists” (not Ivy prestige specifically), i.e. that a university’s prestige could influence the prestige of certain departments. Something similar to this happens in the 2010 NRC ranking, which separates the ranking into two separate ones: the S-ranking, which is based on defined quality, and the R-ranking, which is more of a ranking of reputation for that field. In many cases, you will find a large discrepancy in a university’s placement in the lists, i.e. it does well in the R-ranking (it’s reputable) but does poorly in the S-ranking (it has less defined quality that its reputation would suggest). But for CS, the Ivies actually do better in the S-ranking than in the R-ranking, which suggests that they are better, not worse, than their reputation gives them credit for. If you’d like to see the NRC rankings by subject, the Chronicle has a neat interface for the data (just google it - I would link you to it but it’s not loading for some reason).</p>
<p>Still waiting on those sources from you. If you don’t have them, then please at least give a rationalization other than “it’s my opinion.”</p>
<p>Metrics such as publication volume are interesting as indicators of research productivity. A high ratio of citations to publications suggests the research is influential. Both of these numbers may be significant to prospective graduate students.</p>
<p>For most prospective undergraduates, other measurements may be more important. The undergraduate CS curriculum is very similar from school to school. A high level of faculty research volume or impact won’t necessarily translate into higher quality classroom instruction (although it may correlate with more or better internship opportunities). Consider other indicators of overall quality such as small classes, selective admissions, good financial aid, and an extracurricular life that isn’t overly dominated by sports, fraternities, and substance abuse. Beyond the CS department, look for small, discussion-based classes with plenty of writing assignments. The “soft” skills you acquire in college will be at least as important as your technical knowledge for long-term advancement in many careers.</p>
<p>In these respects, in my opinion, the Ivies are easily competitive with any public university (regardless of CS department rating) for a prospective CS student. Some of the top LACs (such as Harvey Mudd) may be worth considering, too, even though they don’t show very good research metrics at all. They can offer even smaller classes and stronger undergraduate focus than most of the Ivies. LACs have some of the highest rates of PhD production (number of alumni PhD completions per capita). In some cases (not Harvey Mudd), Asians are *under-*represented minorities at these schools, meaning you could have a relative advantage for admission or merit aid (where offered).</p>
<p>One note about Berkeley: there are two majors in which one can do CS (same CS courses):</p>
<p>Electrical Engineering and Computer Science (EECS) in the College of Engineering
Computer Science in the College of Letters and Science (L&S CS)</p>
<p>Admissions standards can be different; EECS is generally regarded as being harder to get into than L&S (although this could at least theoretically change depending on the volume of applications). Note that all applicants to L&S are considered in one pool and those admitted enter as undeclared, to declare later, while applicants to Engineering can apply to and enter declared in a major (or undeclared, but that is generally regarded as being harder to get into). Some L&S majors are capped and require applying to with a higher minimum GPA than that needed to remain in good academic standing; L&S CS is not currently capped.</p>
<p>The curriculum difference is mainly that EECS requires physics and allows the student to concentrate on EE more than CS (no minimum number of upper division CS courses). L&S CS is likely easier to do a double major in math, economics, etc. with. EECS is ABET-accredited while L&S CS is not, although ABET-accreditation is generally not an issue in CS.</p>
<p>tk21769, while I agree with your conclusion about the Ivies, I have long taken issue with the importance of “higher quality classroom instruction” - IMO that’s largely irrelevant. I know, it sounds counterintuitive, but I’ve found that very little is gained from having a prof who’s better at teaching: if you need someone to get in front of you and lecture in order for you to learn, then you’ve got much bigger problems. Rather, most of the value that comes from a higher-quality CS education lies in the structure of the curriculum itself: what ideas and skills it focuses on, how it goes about that (say, lots of projects, fewer exams, more presentations, team work, discussion- and problem-based sections), what directions it requires students to learn (say, allowing them to focus on specific aspects of CS or interdisciplinary studies), and what opportunities it affords students (research, internships, etc.). I think all of that is very highly correlated with high productivity in research - when a department has a “reputation to uphold,” they will tend to have the strongest and most innovative CS curricula.</p>
<p>At Stanford, for example, barely any CS classes that an undergrad might take (and probably most grad classes as well) will be small. Most will be medium sized; some will be large. Regardless, I don’t think anyone would say that Stanford’s CS education is lacking, and that’s because it’s one of the most innovative in its CS curriculum. For example, it’s redone its entire requirements and now has students complete a common ‘core’ with required focus in ‘tracks’ that range from graphics to AI to bioinformatics. It’s also pioneering a new lecture format: breaking up lectures into 10 to 15-minute topic segments that are recorded and posted online for students to view at their leisure, while class time is spent on group activities with the guidance of the prof and TAs. Most of the upper-division classes have no exams and instead have only projects and presentations. Other top CS schools have instituted similar changes.</p>
<p>That’s why I think that looking at research/impact is very useful to undergrads, even though at face value it doesn’t seem like it’d be relevant. In fact virtually every CS ranking is directly or indirectly based on research/impact and I’d say that rankings are a nice general guide in CS.</p>
<p>You’re right that for CS the Ivies are competitive in the ways that you mention. They’re also competitive in research productivity in CS, which I don’t think is a coincidence.</p>
<p>Get rid of brown, Penn, Yale, and Princeton. I’d just focus on Berkeley if you are in state. Admissions are really grade oriented for uc schools and highly predictable. You can go to Berkeley, the best computer science school in the nation with Stanford, MIT, and cmu at half the price.</p>
<p>Yes … but I don’t believe high-quality classroom instruction consists, primarily, in having a professor get in front of you and lecture in order for you to learn. An essential element of good instruction, as I understand it, is in getting students to take an active role in their own learning. That would usually involve lots of discussion, Socratic questioning, writing assignments, labs, teamwork, problem-solving, presentations and other learning activities. This is a contact sport for both teachers and students.</p>
<p>There shouldn’t be a strict dichotomy between teaching and research. Teaching good students should expose professors to new ways of looking at research problems. Seminal research should make professors better teachers. Active learning at the undergraduate level should be enhanced by a robust research environment. Whether that actually happens at every top research university depends on many factors (such as curriculum design, student qualifications, and class sizes).</p>
<p>Berkeley may indeed be one of the top 4 or 5 computer science schools. However, a low- or middle-income student may well pay a lower out-of-pocket price to attend Brown, Penn, Yale, or Princeton … get equally good CS training, and get a better overall undergraduate experience. All these schools offer pretty much the same standard ACM curriculum. Berkeley may have a few more faculty superstars, but any Ivy will have rather consistently good faculty with a smaller s:f ratio, exceptional students from all over America and the world, and more money to shower on undergrads (for aid and everything else). Apply to both and see how the decisions shake out. I wouldn’t recommend paying double to attend an Ivy over Berkeley, but think it makes sense to pay some manageable premium for a top private school (and it certainly would make sense to go private if the after-aid cost is actually lower).</p>
<p>Maryland = University of Maryland (UMCP)-- excellent department, flexible on placement, with your stat’s you’d have a good shot at merit, assuming you pay respect to their essays. There is a goodly contingent of tippy-top students who have turned down Ivies/MIT, et al to be there. Sergei Brin of Google was a math/CS major at UMCP.</p>
[quote]
You’re suggesting public schools like Maryland and UNC, which no one worth their salt would put ahead of most of the Ivies for CS.[\quote]</p>
<p>When looking at a full ride Banneker/Key scholarship, no debt, early graduate work, ability to do significant research and a strong link to Google and other major CS companies (oh, yeah, and excellent grad school placement), don’t be so sure about that.</p>
<p>Don’t apply ED (binding) to a school unless it is definitely your first choice and you are certain that you can afford to attend it.</p>
<p>For EA, if the schools you are considering doing EA are non-restrictive, then apply EA to all of them. If you get into any with sufficient financial aid, those become automatic safeties, and you can drop applying for any school you like less than those schools.</p>
<p>However, if the schools you are considering doing EA are restrictive in that they don’t want you applying to other schools EA, then you need to choose one to apply EA if you apply to any EA. Stanford is restrictive in that if you apply EA there, you cannot apply to any other private school EA.</p>
<p>Of course when you consider those additional factors, they seem more attractive, but I was talking about only the quality of the department itself, under the same scope of a ranking.</p>
<p>To rephrase the statement you quoted, if you were to ask a CS professor about their thoughts on the relative quality of CS departments, I doubt any prof would put UMD and UNC ahead of some of the Ivies that are strong in CS, like Princeton. UMD could be placed ahead of Penn, Columbia, etc. (some rankings do, others don’t) but UNC? No way.</p>
<p>How does EA/ED affect my admission chances for the good or bad? Also, what if my ED choice is my top choice, BUT I’m not sure if I can afford it without knowing my financial aid package?</p>