I was accepted into the College of Engineering for computer engineering and computer science combined major(apparently i will have access to COE and Khoury, but housed mainly in COE). I am in a bit of a dilemma as of now for two reasons:
Changing to pure CS in Khoury: I am mainly interested in computer science, and would like to get as in-depth into the CS syllabus as possible. However, the combined major supposedly has 100% of both the syllabus (not sure though). Should I go for breadth (CE + CS) over depth (only CS)? And is the combined major actually worth it in terms of job prospects and prestige? I am not completely against studying the engineering syllabus but i am not particularly excited about the chemistry and electrical portion of it.
If i plan to change the major from combined major in COE to CS in Khoury, is my request likely to be accepted? (considering the high demand for CS in Khoury). When would I most probably get the decision? if my request is rejected what can I do next?
Sorry for all the questions, i’m a confused hs soul atm. Please help
Additional information: I have already paid the enrollment deposit. I am an international student. I didn’t get honors. I applied RD. I haven’t visited the campus yet, but when I was going through the syllabus I realized I may have made a mistake.
I believe you can change majors over the summer before you start through the student portal. CE+CS is a very demanding major, switch to straight CS if you want. I think these summer major changes all just get accepted. Northeastern claims they do not admit by major and therefore changing before you start is not a problem.
Yep shouldn’t be too hard of a change and pure CS sounds like the right call. Do the change ASAP so your Fall schedule changes accordingly. In my experience change of major requests before arrival take about a week and I have yet to hear of one being denied.
Thanks for the prompt reply. I will request the change this weekend.
But generally speaking, do you think the combined major is held in higher regard compared to pure CS? Which is more popular among students and favorable in terms of Co-op opportunities?
Neither is necessarily harder or better for co-op, they are just different. CS/CE is more hardware focused and cuts upper division CS classes for hardware classes and requires some electives overlap with CS and CE. It’s better if you want to be working on things like embedded software or robotics while it would be a bit wasted if you wanted to go into web/mobile/systems/database software development or the like. I think CS is larger in size than CS/CE but that’s no reason to make a major decision.
They just sent a mail saying they have approved my request and my major has been changed from the College of Engineering (COE) – Computer Engineering and Computer Science to the Khoury College of Computer Sciences – Computer Science
Honestly, I don’t know how it can be this simple. It’s fantastic. It was approved in less than 2 days.
Such major changes are easy at Northeastern. The only exceptions are if you want to switch to Nursing, Pharmacy or Physical Therapy they will reevaluate your application. Also the portfolio programs in CAMD would, of course, require a student to submit a portfolio for evaluation.
For context, Northeastern admits people to the university as a whole and not by major, and there aren’t many (barely any) restrictions on taking classes in any subject, so major changes aren’t an issue of “spots” to be allocated unless there are massive changes. The entire school is designed around flexibility given how many options there are between academics, co-op, study abroad, etc. Public schools in particular that admit by major and rely on tight funding are often more restrictive as a result as well. The request process is only to safeguard in the event that some sort of massive push to one major that did not have space occurs, but these things tend to balance themselves out.
